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UNITED STATES OP AMERICA. 



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A RIDE 



OF 



EIGHT HUNDRED MILES 



FRANCE, 



A R I D E 



OF 



EIGHT HUNDRED MILES 



IN 



FRANCE; 

Containing a Sketch of the Face of the Country, of its Rural 
Economy, of the Towns and Villages, of Manufactures and 
Trade, and of such of the Manners and Customs as mate- 
rially differ from those of England : Also, an Account of 
the Prices of Land, House, Fuel, Food, Raiment, Lahour, 
and other Things, in different parts of the Country; the 
design being to exhibit a true picture of the present State 
of the People of Frauce. 

To which is added, 

A GENERAL VIEW OF THE FINANCES OF THE KINGDOM. 



By JAMES PAUL COBBETT, 

STUDENT OF LINCOLN's-INN. 



- ■ - 



LONDON : 



PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, 

AND PUBLISHED BY CHARLES CLEMENT, NO. 183, 
FLEET- STREET. 



1824. 
<3- 



ITBBUBftAt?! 
OF C0NG&BS8 

WASH1BQTOH 



B. Bensley, Bolt Court, fleet Street. 






PREFACE. 

The paragraphs of this work are num- 
bered for the purpose of reference, that 
mode being deemed more useful to the 
reader than a numbering of the pages. 

2. To make apologies, for want of 
ability to do that which one has volun- 
tarily undertaken to do; to make im- 
portunate appeals to the indulgence of 
the public: these must of necessity 
proceed from affectation ; and, in an- 
swer to them, the public may with pro- 
priety always say : " If such be your 
consciousness of inability, if so great be 
your need of indulgence, why did you 
publish? If you be sincere, you ought 
to have been silent : if you be not sin- 
cere, how are we to believe your narra- 
tives and descriptions ?" 

B2 



V PREFACE. 

3. The truth is, that very little of what 
is worthy of the name of ability is re- 
quired to perform the task which I have 
undertaken, and which is little more than 
that of writing down an account of what 
I saw and what I heard, and these relating, 
besides, to matters by no means of an 
occult, or of an extraordinary character. 

4. The motive to the performing of 
the " Ride" was simply this : to gratify 
a wish of my Father, who was desirous 
to know the real state of the people of 
France, and especially of the farmers 
and labourer^; and, as to the motives to 
the publication, they are such as those, 
by which, I dare say, most authors are 
animated. 

5. With respect to the manner of 
executing my task, it is, the reader may 
be assured, the best that I am master of. 
The wish which caused me to go to 
France was the best possible security for 



PREFACE. V 

my scrupulous adherence to truth in the 
account that was to be the fruit of my 
journey. I have cared much less about 
any thing else than about this. I tra- 
velled with that partiality for England, 
which we all so naturally feel; but, I 
have, in no case, suffered it to lead me 
out of the path of veracity. 

6. I have set down an account o* 
things, day by day, in the order in which 
they presented themselves to me ; and, 
at the end of my Journal, I have put an 
Index, so full and complete, that the 
reader will be at no loss to find, in a 
few minutes, all that is, in the several 
parts of the book, contained, upon any 
particular subject. 

7. In England, little is known about 
the geography of the departments of 
France. We always talk about Normandy, 
Picardy, Burgundy, Champagne ; and not 
about this or that department : therefore, 



VI PREFACE. 

as I was desirous to make my journal as 
intelligible as I could, I have spoken of 
provinces and not of departments. 

8. If I have, in some few instances, 
spoken harshly of our neighbours, as is 
the case, for instance, with regard to the 
hard and degrading labours thrown upon 
the female sex, I beg that this harshness 
may be ascribed solely to a sense of 
justice, and by no means to a want of 
friendly feeling towards a people, with 
whose sobriety, whose honest dealings, 
and whose politeness, I was greatly 
delighted. 



JAMES P. COBBETT. 



Kensington, 3 Dec. 1823. 



A 

RIDE 

OF 

EIGHT HUNDRED MILES 

IN 

FRANCE. 



CALAIS — PROVINCE OF ART01S. 

Saturday Morning, 10 Oct. 1823. 
9. Yesterday morning was so unpleasant, 
that, taking the advice of a friend at Dover, 
I made up my mind to the losing of a day in 
that town. The weather, however, got better 
about noon, and a steam-boat being about to 
set off, I got ready, all in hurry, to embark. 
My friend was so good as to render me great 
assistance in getting myself and horse on board 
in time. The wind was fresh, as the sailors 
call it, and, being fair at the same time, the 
steam-boat, which was a very fine vessel, 
brought us over to this place in the short time 
of two hours and a half. 

10. As I bring a horse over with me, it may 
be well to mention some of the particulars 



8 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

attending his passage. The manner of putting 
him on board the vessel was, contrary to my 
expectation, to sling him. Carriages they 
put upon deck ; but a horse has to be lowered, 
by means of a crane, into the hold of the 
vessel. This operation is attended with very 
v , little danger to the horse : he goes into the 
air, suspended from the crane, and plunges 
and squeals a good deal (so did my horse, at 
least) 5 but his strength is so completely sur- 
rounded by the means of strength greater 
than his own, that he is, at last, obliged to 
yield to the superiority ; and, trembling and 
tottering with fear, he suffers himself to be 
introduced to the apartment appropriated to 
passengers of his description. I paid, at Dover 
Custom-house, 4s. duty on my horse ; valuing 
him at 40/. that is, just Is. on 10Z. To porters 
for putting him on buard, 5s. ; and 2s. for a 
halter to tie him up with on board the vessel. 
For his passage, a guinea and a half. On this 
side I pay for him, to the Commissioner of 
Customs and Police, 29 francs and 15 sous, 
including duty, charges for getting him on 
shore, and the Commissioner's fee. 

1 1 . 1 pay, for my own passage, half-a-guinea. 
For the Custom-house charges on my port- 
manteau, 2 francs ; for my passport, 3 francs. 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 9 

12. All the business on this side of the water 
is managed by one person, Monsieur the Com- 
missioner, who is the person you consult upon 
every matter. There is more than one Com- 
missioner in the town ; there is one officer of 
this kind attached to every inn or lodging- 
house of any consequence ; and, when I say 
one person, I mean that, in passing through 
Calais, one of the Commissioners of Customs 
and Police is the only official person that a 
foreigner has any occasion to consult. This 
Commissioner (Commissaire) is a very civil and 
attentive man, and, having all the business 
under his own eye, prevents strangers from 
being imposed upon by any officious person 
belonging to his department. 

13. When 1 arrived at the hotel (Hotel de 
Meurice), after having disembarked my horse, 
I was conducted into the room where they 
were at dinner at what is called the Table 
d'Hote. This Table d' Hote, or Ordinary, is a 
provision for any travellers that may be in the 
house, or passing, about the time that the 
dinner is ready. If they like to dine at this 
general Table a" Hote, they may; if not, they 
may dine in a more private manner, just as 
they please. A Table d' Hole is, also, a place 
at which people who live in the town, or are, at 

B 5 



10 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

least, settled there for a while, dine regularly, or 
generally. Officers of the army, for instance ; 
men in trade, if they do not keep house, as we 
call it | and the like. It is a table like that of 
a boarding-house in America, except that, in 
America, those who are boarded generally 
lodge also. 

14. With the queer sensations that the toss- 
ings of the steam-boat had given me, I did 
not feel inclined to partake in the entertain- 
ment going forward ; and so I set myself down 
by the fire. I was not, however, without some- 
thing to attract my attention. At the head of 
the table there stood a shabby looking fellow, 
tightly buttoned up in an old surtout coat, 
with a black sleek head, and face almost as 
black, who, when first I went into the room, 
was whistling. I soon perceived that this was 
intended as an amusement for the company, 
which it certainly might be, for a little while, 
to any body ; for, such was this person's excel- 
lence in his way, that, before I had been five 
minutes in his company, he reminded me, I 
thought, of almost every creature that can 
make a noise. His talent appeared to consist 
wholly in mimicry. He prefaced each part of 
his performance by a speech in explanation 
of the subject that was to follow. The might* 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. H 

ingale, the thrush, the cuckoo, the sucking pig y 
every thing, indeed, he imitated with astonish- 
ing correctness; but, when he came to the 
frog, it was so palpably his chef cVceuvre, that I 
could not help departing from that gravity 
which, out of reverence for French politeness, 
I had managed to preserve throughout the 
rest of his imitations. 

15. My cheer has been very good at Calais ; 
but, like Gil Blas in the case of the trout, I have 
had to pay for it. My bill is as follows : Tea, 1 
franc and 50 centimes : but before I proceed, I 
must give a comparative statement of the mon ey 
of the twocountries. The.legal money of account, 
in France, consists of francs and centimes; that 
is to say, of francs and hundredths of francs. 
This is in imitation of the United States, who 
hav^ divided their dolla?* into a hundred things, 
called cents. The coins in France are six or 
eight in number, and are of copper, silver, and 
gold ; but, the money of account is all that I 
have to do with here, because my object is 
comparison. The franc is called also the livre. 
A sou is the twentieth part of a franc ; and of 
course, a centime is the fifth part of a sou. A 
franc is equal to ten pence English. A sou is, of 
course, equal to an English halfpenny. This 



12 A RIDB IN FRANCE. 

is not exactly the proportion ; but, it is quite 
near enough for all my purposes. 

16. I now, therefore, proceed with my bill. 
Tea, 1 franc and 10 sous ; half a chicken, 

1 franc and 10 sous ; lodging, 2 francs ; break- 
fast, 1 franc and 10 sous. For my horse, four 
'picotlns (each about half a* gallon) of oats, 

2 francs and 8 sous ; two bottes (bundles of 
about 10 pounds weight) of hay, 1 franc and 
16 sous; two picotins of bran, 16 sous; two 
bottes of straw, 16 sous. All together, 12 
francs and six sous. To the waiter, 1 franc; 
to the chambermaid, 1 franc; to the boot- 
boy, 10 sous ; to the ostler, 1 franc. 

17. This bill of 10s. 3d. falls, however, 
short of that of the little village of Dartford, 
in Kent, though Calais must be looked upon 
as the Dover of France. For far inferior ac- 
commodation at Dartford, my bill was 1 Is. 6d. 
I cannot see the bottes of hay charged in my 
bill, without being enlightened as to our old 
saying (which has so often puzzled me), of 
looking for a needle in a bottle of hay ; which 
saying is, doubtless, of Norman origin, cor- 
rupted by us, who have, at Jast, put bottle in- 
stead of botte. 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 13 

18. Calais has a population of 7>600 in- 
habitants. It is rather a lively place, on 
account of the numbers of English people 
that are almost constantly arriving here, and 
those of our country people (for I understand 
there are a great many) that are settled for a 
time in the town, or about the neighbourhood. 
In the centre of the town there is a large 
square, in which the market is held, and 
within which, indeed, appears to be encom- 
passed the greater part of the stir and inte- 
rest that belong to this place. Calais has 
all the appearance of being strongly fortified. 
There are but two ways of entrance to the 
town ; namely, one gate leading to the sea 
side, and another gate on the opposite side of 
the town, through which I pass in my way to 
Paris. There are no less than three or four 
gates and drawbridges in succession, besides 
the principal gate and its bridge, through and 
over which people must^pass in order to go to 
or come from the town. 



ARDRES PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 

(Four leagues from Calais.) 

Sunday Morning, 12 Oct. 

19. A French land-league is equal to two 

and a half English miles, or thereabouts ; so 



14 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

that my ride of yesterday was only of ten 
miles. The league is generally supposed to 
be equal to three of our miles, but I am sure 
it is not so much as that. 

20. Yesterday the weather was very wet, 
till about noon, when I set off from Calais. 
Coming out of Calais I met a diligence, or 
French coach, with two outriders. The ca- 
valcade, altogether, was the most uncouth 
thing of the kind I had ever seen. I was 
obliged to retreat before it for some distance, 
to find a convenient place to let it go by, on 
account of the fear manifested by my horse. 
I stopped, and let it pass. One of the out- 
riders gave my nag a cut with his whip in 
going by, and I did not expect any salutation 
more polite, from the barbarous appearance 
of the whole 'concern, and especially from the 
manner in wh'ch the horses were driven along, 
which was, by the bawling of the riders, and 
the clacking of their whips in such a manner 
as almost to stun one. There were five horses 
to the vehicle, which looked as cumbersome 
as those things in which they carry wild beasts 
in- England, and certainly less handsome, if 
beauty may be considered in such a case. 
The driver rode on one of the wheel-horses, 
which were two abreast of each other, the 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 15 

three others being all abreast before. A de- 
scription of the dress of the drivers of these 
carriages would appear incredible to an 
Englishman. I have seen caricatures of it 
in England ; but, I expected to find the mode 
of travelling much altered; nevertheless, it 
appears to be nearly the same that it was 
in; my years ago. The driver and the 
outriders wore boots, which admit of no 
comparison with any thing that I ever saw 
before that went by the name of boots. Take 
off the foot, which was twice as big as feet 
generally are, the boot is a long jire-bucket ; 
and if 1 were to fill a sheet of paper, I could 
not convey a more correct idea of the thing. 
The hat worn by the wearers of these boots 
is of the old French fashion ; that is to say, 
inclining in its shape towards a pyramid, the 
width of the crown at the top being, com- 
pared to its width at the bottom, in about the 
same proportion as six inches bear to eight. 
The brim of the hat is remarkably small ; and, 
from under the hind part of this hangs el pigtail, 
which, in respect to its size, needs no alter- 
ation to make it correspond with the boots. 
A great part of the powder belonging to the 
pigtail serves, as the rider bumps upon his 
saddle, to variegate his skeleton jacket, which 
was, in this case, of a blue colour with red collar 



16 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

and cuffs, and of so very scanty a fashion, 
that it appeared to be much too small for the 
wearer : it puts one in mind of one of those 
lucky school-boys, who have not been suf- 
ficiently starved to prevent them from growing 
out of their jackets. 

21. The country, after leaving Calais, is, 
for some miles, entirely flat, and has formerly 
been a common, with furze growing upon it. 
I saw a man at plough at a mile from Calais, 
from whom I found that I had come a mile 
out of my way, having taken the road to 
Dunkirk in mistake. They plough here with 
three horses a breast, and with a plough which 
is ugly, but not so heavy as some of ours in 
England-? and the land appears to be very 
well ploughed. 

22. Before I left Calais yesterday morning, 
I went to the market, Saturday being market- 
day. I saw many farmers with their wheat, 
at some samples of which I looked. The 
wheat seemed to be very good ; I did not see 
a bad sample. I was surprised to see that 
women had so much to do in the corn- market, 
with which market they have so little to do 
in England. I supposed, at first, that they 
must h be buying corn for their own home 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 17 

consumption; but I soon found, from their 
conversation, that they were selling com at 
market just the same as if they had been men. 
Upon the road I saw a great many people, 
mostly women, going to and coming from 
market. They were going, or had been to 
market, it appeared, to buy things for do- 
mestic use; as those that were going home- 
wards, were, I perceived, carrying bread, 
apples, clothes, crockery-ware, and many 
other articles. These people were all well 
dressed. The labourers pretty much in the 
same fashion as the English, with smock- 
frocks and trowsers, made of a linen stuff of 
a blue colour, and shoes and hats like the 
English. The women are strikingly uniform 
in their dress. In wet weather they all wear 
cloaks. They very seldom wear bonnets, but 
caps instead, which, when it rains, they cover 
with a handkerchief, or with the hood of their 
cloaks. I speak here of what are called pea- 
sants, or country people. 

23. The soil about here is of a dark sandy 
kind, but pretty good. I see some men walk- 
ing on high pattens. 

24. Ardres is a little fortified town, with a 
population of about 1500. Between this place 



18 A RIDE EN FRANCE. 

and Calais there is a bridge, called Le Pont- 
sa?is-Pareil, which name means, that there 
is not such another bridge to be found. The 
curiosity of it is, that there . are two canals 
crossing each other under the bridge at right 
angles, the one going from St. Omers to Calais, 
and the other from Ardres to Gravelines. 

25. Set out from Ardres this morning, 
having slept there on account of bad weather. 
The inn, or auherge, at which I lodged last 
night, was the best that I could find in the place. 
The stable for my horse was close and good, 
but not divided into stalls; it was just such a 
stable as a good cart-horse stable is in England; 
not so clean, and not kept in such order, as 
the stables of inns in England are; never- 
theless quite good enough, excepting only in 
the circumstance of there being no stalls, 
w T hich does not do so well where several 
strange horses have to lodge in the same 
stable. As soon as I got to the inn I bespoke 
a bed-room, to take possession of which I 
went through the kitchen, and then up stairs. 
The bed-furniture and linen and the room 
were all clean and neat, but in place of a 
carpet, there was a sprinkling of sand upon 
the floor. The weather was very chilly, and 
some dinner which I had asked for was given 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 19 

to me in a room, comfortable in all respects, 
save that of its having no fire in it. I wanted 
very much to get into some place warmer than 
this, and the kitchen being the only place 
where I could see a fire, I made bold to enter 
that, and was rather surprised on being asked 
to sit down there. I did not find the company 
disagreeable, however, and passed the evening 
in a manner much to my satisfaction. 



ST. OMERS — PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 

{Six leagues from, Ardres.) 

Sunday Night, 12 Oct. 

£6. As I came out of Ardres this morning, 
I met the country people, at seven o'clock, 
going to church. At two leagues from Ardres, 
passed through the village of La Recousse, 
a pretty little place. The harvest nearly 
finished. Saw some horse-beans, a good many, 
all along the road from Calais. The beans 
are standing in the fields in sheaf and in 
shock, and seem to be very fine ; but the 
harvest of these is not yet begun. Saw one 
piece of oats and one piece of barley, yet in the 
field, but cut. The harvest here must have 
been full a month later than in the eastern part 
of Kent 5 that is to say, at only about fifty 
miles off. The beans have all been housed in 



20 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

Kent more than a month. They grow rape, 
or coleseed, here, from which they make a 
great deal of oil. It is sowed in the spring 
and transplanted in the fall of the year; not 
with a setting-stick, but with a plough. They 
lay the plants, at about a foot apart, against the 
ploughed land, and then turn a furrow against 
them, laying a row of plants for every furrow 
they turn. The seed ripens and is harvested 
the following summer. — The soil here is chalky 
and apparently very good; with hard flinty 
hills, and muddy by-roada (in this weather, 
which is wet). — There is a row of planted 
trees, on each side of the great road, for almost 
every step of the way from Calais to this 
place. The trees are, for the most part, wil- 
lows, black Italian poplars, ashes and elms, 
which latter appear to be much cultivated in 
this way. These trees give the road and 
country a very fine appearance ; and (which 
is by no means an unpleasant circumstance) 
there are no turnpike gates. I have seen some 
woods, at a distance, but the land near the road 
is, in general, very open ; in many places, for 
a thousand acres together, and more, nothing 
but an open plain. The cattle that I have 
seen are good. Good cart-horses and good 
cows. As for the sheep, I have seen very 
few, and those were at a distance from the 
road. 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 21 

27. I got to this place about eleven o'clock, 
in time to save myself from a ducking. Went 
this afternoon to see the cathedral, which is a 
very fine building ; and also to see the ruins 
of the church of St. Berlin, a great part of 
which yet remains undemolished by the revo- 
lution, during which the riches of the monks of 
St. Benedict, to whom it belonged, were con- 
fiscated. That part of the church which remains, 
stands on a base of about 120 yards by 60. The 
convent, to which it belonged, is entirely 
destroyed ; and the remnant of the church (a 
beautiful piece of building) is now being sold 
to build houses for the citizens ! The original 
possessions of this community were immense. 
The flour-mills that belonged to it have not, 
like the rest of the establishment, gone out of 
fashion. They remain, and grind wheat to 
feed the people of Saint Omers. All the land 
which used to belong to it in the shape of 
beautiful gardens, is now cut up and built 
upon, or made into gardens of a less luxurious 
description. At the entrance, under the tower 
of the church, which remains almost perfect, 
there are some statues of saints, in hewed stone, 
over the porch ; but people have knocked off 
their heads and limbs, at different times, and 
have carried these awav. 



22 A RIDE IN PRANCE. 

Monday Evening, 13 Oct. 

28. 1 have stayed all this day at Saint Omers 
on account of my horse being a little lame. 
I consulted a French Farrier, who told me he 
thought the horse only wanted fresh shoeing ; 
and charged me 15 sous, for his fee as horse- 
doctor, having, besides, come some distance 
to see the patient. Two new shoes for my 
horse cost me 2 francs ; but, the blacksmith 
said he charged, in this sum, 10 sous extra, on 
account of his having done the job in the 
English fashion, which is a little different from 
the French. 

29. Having some time on my hands, I went 
to see the place, about a mile from Saint 
Omers, which was once the convent of a com- 
munity of Carthusian Monks, and was called 
Le Convent des Chartreux. This convent for- 
merly possessed a great deal of wealth, and 
included, within its possessions, a considerable 
part of the surrounding country. That part 
of the land which is yet undivided, along with 
the remains of the convent, and the gardens, 
now belong to a gentleman of the name of 
Denis, who is the Post-master at St. Omers, 
and who was so polite as to let me look at the 
gardens and the comparatively little that is 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 23 

now to be seen of the ancient building. The 
greater part of the building appears to be 
entirely destroyed. There is still, however, 
a very commodious house remaining of 
it, some of which, in places that have not 
been patched up in a modern fashion, has 
a very venerable appearance. The remains 
of the once grand building, near to which 
is the modest looking dwelling-house of their 
present proprietor, are now made use of as 
the farm-house of the estate, being environed 
by cart-houses, sheds, pig-sties, and the like, 
with which simple offices the altered aspect of 
the convent itself very well corresponds. In 
the gardens, which are protected by a part of 
their old walls, I saw a good deal of fine fruit, 
though there did not appear to be much care 
bestowed on its cultivation. The pippin a" or, 
and a large apple, called the calms, were the best 
of the apples that I saw ; but the pears, the chau- 
montelle, the cuisse-dame, the poire de laPucelle, 
and a pear called the mauquete, were, I think, 
the finest pears I have ever seen, and grew here 
in great abundance. Excepting these fruits, 
there was not much vegetation in the garden, 
worth speaking of. I saw a little false bridge 
(without any water under it), and a little mound 
of earth, which I should not forget to mention, 
because the gardener informed me that these 



24 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

had been made in imitation of our English 
gardeners. The French gardener, however, did 
not appear to have been enamoured of the 
bridge for any great length of time, for I could 
see that it was going to ruin very fast. There 
was a patch of potatoes here, and a plan- 
tation of young elm-trees. The elm-tree is 
much planted, alongside of roads and lanes, 
about houses, and in many of the fields ; and 
these young trees that I saw, were intended to 
be planted out, in this way, on the estate. 

30. This place, Saint Omers, has a popula- 
tion of 21,000 inhabitants, two or three thousand 
of whom are supposed to be English people. 
There is a good deal of manufacturing done 
here, of cloth, glue, leather, starch, soap, and 
some other things. There is a college, and a 
playhouse ; to the latter of which I saw the 
citizens crowding yesterday, Sunday, evening. 
Saint Omers is a fortified town, though not of 
a regular form. The country about it is flat, 
and, to the north west, it is one continued 
marsh nearly all the way to Dunkirk. This 
country of marshes is very curious. It is a 
mass of fields and meadows divided by water 
instead of by hedges and other fences. Canals 
are the roads, ditches the lanes, and boats and 
rafts, the carts and wagons, and also the gates 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 25 

and stiles. The land is rich ; it grows corn, 
carrots, parsnips, hemp, and tobacco, which 
latter is much cultivated in the vicinage of 
Saint Omers, or, correctly, Omer. 

31. The origin of the name of this fine old 
city is curious and interesting. Tradition 
says, that Omer was a most pious and active 
man, and that he caused to be drained the 
marshes above mentioned, and enabled the peo- 
ple to cultivate them. There is not a farmer 
within ten miles of Saint Omers, or a farmer's 
wife, who will not tell you this. Nor is history 
silent as to the virtues and services of Omer, 
who, it appears, was born in the Vale of Gol- 
denthal, near Constance, on the Upper Rhine. 
He is reported to have been of a rich and noble 
family, and to have entered in early life into 
the monastery of Luxeuil. He was appointed 
Bishop of Terouane, by King Dagobert, in 
636, in "v^hich office he greatly distinguished 
himself by his industry, zeal, and piety. The 
spot (and most probably a large tract round it) 
where Saint Omers now stands, was, at the 
period here spoken of, the domain, or part of 
the domain of a gentleman, who had been 
recently converted, and who bestowed it on 
the church. This spot, which was then called 
Sithieu, was, under the direction of Omer, 
c 



26 



A RIDE IN FRANCE. 



aided by his nephew Bertin, brought into 
cultivation ; and on it Omer founded a mo- 
nastery, which he called the monastery of 
Sithieu, which flourished exceedingly. Omer 
died in 688 ; and Bertin, whom he had made 
the chief of the monastery of Sithieu, died in 
706, in a little hermitage to which he had 
retired. Gratitude to Omer caused the city, 
which rose up round the monastery, to be 
called by his name ; and the same cause gave 
to the monastery the name of Bertin. Hence 
come the names of this ancient city and of 
that famous convent, the fragment of the 
church of which I mentioned in paragraph 27. 



SAINT POL PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 

(Thirteen leagues from St. Omers, through Aire, 
Litters, and P ernes.) 

Tuesday Evening, 14 Oct. 
3£. My bill, for two day's board, and two 
night's lodging, at Saint Omers, amounted to 
7 francs ; and that for the keep of my horse 
during the two days and two nights, 6 francs. 
This was not a heavy sum, considering that I 
was treated with great civility, and that my 
fare was very good, although the inn was not 
the largest in the town. The French manner 
of cooking is so materially different from the 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 27 

English, that it would be difficult for me to 
describe,, with particularity, the sort of dinner 
that I got at this inn. The French are famed 
for eating a great deal of vegetable, and but 
little of animal food. I, however, have found 
it quite the contrary, as far as I could judge by 
what I saw of their cookery at Saint Omers ; 
for, while the people who dined at the Table 
d'Hote ate meat in a great variety of shapes, 
I never saw an?/ vegetables upon the table, 
except salad, which the French are very fond 
of, and some little pieces of carrot, onion, and 
garlick, which I found mingling together in 
the soups, fricassees, and ragouts. 

33. As I came out of Saint Omers this 
morning, I took notice of a fine old church, 
which, I was informed, used to be called the 
church of the Jesuits. I perceived some strong 
marks of the Revolution upon its exterior, 
which is, in general, much defaced, while the 
gothic window-places are filled up by a neg- 
ligent application of some old hurdles and 
straw, in the stead of glass, to keep the wea- 
ther out. The inside of the church is con- - 
verted into a riding-school, and a place in 
which to break in young horses! 

34, Aire is a fortified town of considerable 

c2 



28 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

size, in which there are some manufactures 
like those of Saint 'Omers. It is situate at 
the confluence of the rivers Lys and Laquette. 
Lillers is a village of no note, in particular, on 
the river Navez; and Pernes is a village rather 
larger than Lillers, hut one in which I could 
see nothing very interesting ; as I may say, 
indeed, of most of the little places in this part 
of the country; for, except in their situation, 
or the views that surround them, they very 
seldom have any beauty belonging to them. 
The country towns and villages, unlike the 
generality of those in England, are dirty look- 
ing and confined in their streets. They have, 
however, almost without an exception, plenty of 
trees of various kinds planted about them, and 
this is a great advantage to their appearance. 

35. The soil hereabouts is stiff, with a good 
deal of brick earth underneath the surface. 
In this part of the country the horse-bean 
forms a great proportion of the crop. It is cul- 
tivated here more for the fatting of pigs, than 
as food for horses. There is a vast quantity 
of beans on the land, generally in sheaves, 
and, now and then, some yet growing. The 
manner of harvesting these is, to pull them up 
by the roots (but they sometimes cut them), 
then bind them in sheaves and stack them. 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 29 

I saw many women employed in harvesting 
the beans ; indeed, I see women doing almost 
every kind of work that is to be done upon a 
farm. There are full as many women em- 
ployed in the fields as there are men, and, 
I think, even more. They manage and har- 
vest the flax, a good deal of which is grown 
here, and the cress, of the stalks of which they 
make brooms, after threshing out the seed, for 
oil. The women appear to do all the turnep- 
hoeing that is required here; but turneps do 
not seem to be by any means a general crop, 
for I see but few of them upon the land. The 
dress of the women that I see at work in the 
fields is coarser than that commonly worn by 
our labourers' wives and daughters; but, it 
exhibits very little of that raggedness, which 
now characterizes the dress of so large a por- 
tion of those who earn their bread by hard 
work in England. 

36. Along here I see the farmers use a 
swing-plough, a very good implement, as light 
as the English swing- plough, and as neatly 
made as our ploughs generally are. The 
poppy is one of the crops cultivated in this 
part. They make use of the poppy, I under- 
stand, for medical purposes altogether. Num- 
bers of women are busy in the harvesting of 



SO a Hide in france. 

these poppies, which they tie up in bundles, 
when dry, and put into stacks, when the seed 
is not collected in the field. In some places 
I see a parcel of women in a field of poppies, 
with a large piece of sackcloth spread upon 
the ground to catch the seed, which they get 
out of the pods by knocking the heads of two 
bundles of poppies together; just as good mo- 
thers in England very often threaten to do 
with the heads of their children, when two 
of them happen to be participators in one 
fault. 

37. In the neighbourhood of this place, 
Saint Pol, is the little village of Azincour, 
on the plains of which was fought the famous 
battle called] the Battle of Jzincour, in the 
reign of Henry the Fifth. — Fine weather 

to-day. 

— ■a^ 

AMIENS — PROVINCE OF PICARDY. 

{Fourteen and a half leagues, through Doulens, 
Fravant and Talmas.) 

Wednesday Evening, 15 Oct. 

38. To-day I saw the people in the fields 
threshing out the seeds of flax, which they do 
with a solid piece of thick flat board, or slab, 
fastened on to a handle ; with this thing they 
rap the flax about on a barn's floor, or on some 



PROVINCE OF PIOARDY. 31 

boards or canvass laid down for the purpose, 
in the fields. Of poppies, also, there is har- 
vesting going on here. Oats and vetches are 
much sowed together, as in England, for 
fodder ; and they cut them here just as the 
seed of each begins to get hard, letting them 
lay on the ground for some time, till suffi- 
ciently dry, and then they are stacked like 
hay. The oats in this part of the country are 
good; though, further towards Calais, they 
are very indifferent. This has been, they in- 
form me, a singularly backward season for 
oats ; and I can see this, indeed, by the quan- 
tity of that crop that remains yet unhoused. 
The other crops that I see upon the ground 
are buckwheat, carrots, and beets, with some 
red clover, which is now being made into hay, 
notwithstanding the lateness of the season. 
Much red clover is grown, as in England, 
along with wheat and barley, for feeding the 
sheep on, a,nd cutting for hay the next year. 
Weather fine, but cold. 

39. I saw something coming along the road, 
which was quite a novelty to me, although I 
had often heard speak of such before : it was 
a young woman riding on a horse, which was 
in the shafts of a cart, and drawing a load of 
flax to the farm-yard. The peculiar manner of 



32 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

sitting upon the horse is what I think worthy 
of mention, and that was, what we in England 
vulgarly call a straddle. 

40. Between this place and Saint Pol I 
passed through a village called Boucmaison. 
It is a village of farm-houses, a thing very 
common here, where there are not, as in 
England, two or three or more good large 
farm-houses to be found within every mile 
square over the country. The greater part of 
the country I have come over is very open, 
and the farm-houses are not so much distri- 
buted over the land as they are in England, 
but are to be found in the little hamlets and 
villages, which they serve, in great measure, 
to compose. This village appeared to have 
scarcely any other than farm-houses in it. 
They were almost all built in one fashion, and 
of one size, with their ends, instead of their 
fronts, facing towards the road. Joining that 
end of the house which is furthest from the 
road, there is, in general, a continuation of 
the roof, under which is the cart-house, stable, 
pigsty, and other out-places belonging to the 
farm-yard. The w r alls of every house, as far 
as I could see, were made of mud, and the 
roofs thatched with straw. The frames of 
the house were very slight, and the mud 



PROVINCE OF PICARDY. 33 

walls built up in a rough manner ; and in no 
case did I observe, except in that of one house 
only, that there was any white-wash on the 
outside of the mud. It is probable that the 
name of this place, Boucmaison, owes its deriva- 
tion to the two French words boiie and maison, 
which, in English, mean mud and house. 

41 . The country is more woody as I come 
on. About here there is much fine beech 
timber, with some oaks, and coppices of hazel 
and withy, and various other sorts of mixed 
underwood. Much of the sowed wheat is up ; 
but I see some of the farmers now sowing 
wheat. 

42. The city of Amiens, which is the capital 
of this province, is on the river Somme, and 
has a good deal of manufactures in it. It has 
formerly, I believe, been well fortified, but 
does not seem to be so at present. Population, 
40,000. The gothic cathedral is well worth 
going to see. It is a beautiful building ; and 
is, I am told, the most complete specimen of 
its style of architecture that now remains in 
France. 



c5 



34 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

SAINT JUST — PROVINCE OF PICARBY. 

(Thirteen leagues from Amiens, through Heber 'court, 
Flers, Breteuil, and Wavignies.) 

Thursday Evening, 16 Oct. 
43. My bill at Amiens amounted to 4 francs 
and 10 sous. I supped and lodged at the inn, 
and gave my horse as much as he chose to 
eat. At the Table d'Hote, at which I supped, 
there were eight or nine persons besides my- 
self. Here I observed, as I have done before, 
the great quantity of meat upon the table, 
and the comparatively small quantity of ve- 
getables. After we had disposed of divers 
ragouts and fricassees, a roasted shoulder of 
mutton was brought in, hot from the spit. I 
had witnessed the cooking of this as I sat by 
the kitchen fire before supper, but had not 
thought of having any of it to eat. However, 
I saw that the shoulder of mutton was con- 
sidered as no superfluity by those who had to 
deal with it, for it was almost entirely con- 
sumed before it had been a long while upon 
the table. Rosseau says, that the French 
people are more gentle and humane than the 
English ; that they have not so much cruelty, 
or bloodthirstiness, in their character, as we 
have. He accounts for this assumed fact by 
supposing that we eat too much of animal food, 



PROVINCE OF PlCARDY. 35 

which is not sufficiently cooked; while his 
countrymen, on the contrary, subsist, in a 
great measure, on legumes, or vegetables. If 
I had adopted the principle of this great author, 
in judging of the company in which I supped 
at Amiens, their manner of treating the shoul- 
der of mutton must have induced me to doubt 
their possession of that humanity which, from 
the courteousness of their behaviour, I gave 
them full credit for* 

44. I find the ostlers at inns quite 'polite 
enough, though, in point of work, very dif- 
ferent from the same class of people in England. 
To clean a horse they make use of a curry- 
comb and a brush (which are imported from 
England for the purpose) ; but, they will not 
fatigue themselves in their application of these 
instruments, as I have experienced in the 
case of my own horse, which has not had a 
real cleaning since I left Dover. I have de- 
sired, upon all occasions, that he should be 
well cleaned ; but I have met with no ostler 
that seemed willing to understand what I 
meant, if I wanted him to keep on combing or 
brushing my horse for more than a very few 
minutes at a time. To wash a horse is not an 
uncommon thing here. I do not mean the 
legs of the horse merely, but almost all over 



36 A tilDE IN PRANCE. 

the carcass of the animal, even when the 
travelling is not at all muddy. Passer a Veau, 
which means, to pass, or to go through the 
water, is the expression they make use of, when 
they talk of taking your horse to the river or 
pond. The horse is ridden into the water up 
to his belly, and then, on his coming out again, 
if he stand in need of any dressing above where 
the water has reached, the ostler dismounts, 
and, taking some water up in his hand, or 
with a whisp of straw, dashes it over the upper 
parts of the horse's body. At Amiens, when 
I got up early this morning to start, I found, 
when I went into the stable, that my horse 
had been washed ! He was wet nearly all 
over. It was a clear cold morning ; and my 
horse, just returned from the watering-place, 
stood in the midst of a little fog, if 1 may so 
describe it, produced by the co-operation of 
the warmth of his body along with the cold 
water which had been thrown over him by the 
ostler. While I stood wondering to see my 
nag in such a pickle, the ostler came up to 
me, and, making me a very polite bow, said, 
<e I salute you, Sir j you see I have passed your 
horse through the water." He gave me, at 
the same time, a very arch smile, which 
seemed to say, " does he not look nice now ?'* 
What could I say to such a fellow as this .> 



PROVINCE OP PICARDY. 37 

45. I have mentioned before, the rows oj 
trees that grow on each side of the road that I 
am travelling. From Calais to this place, 
with scarcely any open interval, there are 
these two rows of trees all the way. Elm- 
trees appear to be the favourites ; but, from 
Talmas to Saint Just, a distance of more than 
twenty leagues, apple and pear trees have been 
employed in this capacity for the whole dis- 
tance, to the exclusion of all others. The 
fruit of these trees is very insipid. The trees 
do not seem to have been selected at all for 
their fruit : indeed, most of them appear to 
have come from seed, without any attention 
being paid to them on any account but that 
of their wood. They grow about the fields, as 
well as alongside of the roads ; and of the 
apples, such as they are, a good deal of cider is 
made. I tasted some of this at Flers, where 
I stopped to breakfast, and it was poor stuffy 
but, as I was told, very cheap. 

46. I saw, as I passed through some little 
villages, which are composed of farm-houses, 
for the most part, several women threshing 
wheat and rye with a flail, of the same de- 
scription as that used by the English threshers. 
Women also going to market, leading asses 
and mules, of which auimals great use is made 



OS A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

here. On the backs of these they bring loads 
of vegetables of all sorts to the markets of the 
larger towns and villages. 

47. The soil here is. rather lighter^ with 
much chalk, in places, on the surface. Sainfoin 
much cultivated. Some lucerne ; the greenest 
crop on the ground, except the coleseed (colsa, 
they call it here : our name is a corruption), 
which is a very general crop, all along the 
road. Sheep here; two kinds, Flemish sheep, 
and Spanish sheep; the latter, in some places, 
looking very well. They tell me that these 
have degenerated in France ; but they are far 
the best, in every respect, that I have seen 
yet. The Flemish sheep are very poor things ; 
coarse in the fleece, long-legged, like deer, 
and light in the carcass. There are, how- 
ever, some of these that are pretty good sheep ; 
but, comparing the best of them with almost 
any kind of our English sheep, they are de- 
cidedly had. 

48. I stopped to breakfast to-day at Flers. 
I paid 1 franc for my breakfast, and 5 sous for 
a feed of oats for my horse. The coffee that 
they gave me here was exceedingly good; 
but I have found this good every where in 
France. Bread, of which the French eat a 



PROVINCE OF PICARDY. 39 

great deal, is very good here. The inn at 
which I put up at Flers was, as is frequently 
the case in this country, a farm-house as well 
as an inn. The generality of the inns have, as 
respects the interior part of them, very much 
the appearance of an old-fashioned English 
farm house. The fire-place of the kitchen, in 
particular, is just such as we see in all the 
old English farm-houses ; but, in general, the 
kitchens here are veiy dirty, and the floor 
of the dining room, whether it be boarded or 
paved, seldom looks as if it had been lately 
washed. A labourer at Flers gets from 1 to 
2 and a half francs a day, according to his 
abilities ; journeymen carpenters, bricklayers, 
and the like, about the same. The price of 
beef here is 8 sous the pound; mutton the 
same. A loaf of bread, about the size of the 
English quartern loaf, sells for 5 sous ; a tur- 
key, 3 francs; a pair of ducks, 3 francs; a pair 
of fowls, 2 francsV I saw a large flock of 
turkeys, about fifty in number, roving in the 
stubble fields, with a girl to take care of them. 
These were like the wild turkeys in America, 
not very large, but the whole of them as black 
as crows. 

49. Between this and Amiens, near a little 
village called Aicanois, there is a vineyard. 



40 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

consisting, perhaps, of about fifty acres. The 
untowardness of the season had rendered the 
crop of grapes very indifferent. This is the 
first piece of vineyard that I have seen on the 
road. The vines were growing very low, 
tied to little sticks, as our carnations are tied 
up in the gardens in England ; and, from all 
the ideas I had had of vines, before I saw these, 
I could not conceive at first what sort of ve- 
getables they could be. 

50. I remark, as I go along, that the com- 
mon people are very civil and obliging, 
whenever I ask them any questions about 
what I do not myself understand. There is 
nothing uncouth, nothing boorish, in their 
manners. They explain to you, as well as 
they can, what you want to be made ac- 
quainted with; and, when they do not in- 
stantly comprehend your meaning, they seem 
as anxious to anticipate it,*as if you were not 
a stranger, but rather one to whom they have 
been used to talk. This is a great merit, and 
a mark of intelligence in the French people. 
It enables you to get along with them, which 
they cannot well do with us in England. A 
Frenchman is most completely out of his ele- 
ment in England; while an Englishman in 
France, though the country may appear very 



PROVINCE OF PICARDY. 41 

strange at first, finds, in the courtesy of the 
people, a great deal to reconcile him to the 
strangeness of their customs. 

51. Hereabouts they have much wheat 
land. The stubble is now being cut, tied up 
in bundles, and carried in as litter for the 
cattle in winter. I see, in many farm-houses, 
knitting and spinning going on, and some 
looms, one or two in a house, which are worked 
mostly by the women. 

52. When I got to this place, there was to 
be, in two days' time, a fair, for the sale of 
cattle. I saw some men, a most simple look- 
ing description of horse-jockeys, with their 
horses, which they had brought to be sold at 
the fair. These horses were, generally, colts, 
just fit to work ; and some of them were very 
pretty horses. They were all nearly of one 
breed, such as they use for the plough, for 
farmers to ride upon, and for post-horses ; in 
all which various capacities, according to the 
manner of the French, they are employed. 
These horses had shape to recommend them. 
They were, mostly, of a middling size, and 
much of the same make as a light English 
cart-horse. The price of one of them here 
is, they tell me, about 300 francs, or 12L 10s. 



42 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

53. The corn is ground here almost entirely 
by windmills, half a dozen of which are very 
nearly always, at a time, to be seen, in tra- 
velling along the road. There are some mills 
turned by water, but comparatively few. 



ECOUEN PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 

(Fourteen leagues from Saint Just, through Cler~ 
viont, Luigneville, Chantilly, and Luzarches.) 

Friday Evening, 17 Oct. 

54. The soil here is stiff, with a good deal of 
chalk and lime-stone. There are some fine 
coppices of oak, and some good oak timber. 

55. Early this morning, on leaving Saint 
Just, I saw some sheep in a fold. The fold 
was made of hurdles, much like those used in 
our sheep-folding. But the care of the sheep 
here is somewhat different from that of the 
English. The shepherd, accompanied by two 
or three dogs, is (unlike some pastors else- 
where) always along with his flock. He attends 
them through the day, while they are roving 
about; and, in the night, he sleeps alongside 
of the fold, in a small wooden house, which is 
placed upon wheels, as a cart is, with a pole to 
draw it from place to place, as the fold itself 
may have to be removed. 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 43 

56. Some hemp is grown here, I see; but 
most of the land is icheat and oat land, with 
some lucerne for the cows. Stick Leans (hari- 
cot, the French call them,) are cultivated here 
for the table. The French eat these boiled ; 
that is, the seed part of the bean, after it is 
ripe and hard. I saw an old lady carrying 
some of these off the ground. There was, 
growing in rows, in the interval between the 
rows of beans, a winter crop of some plant. 
I asked her the name of this plant, which, she 
informed me, was chardon (thistle). It is a 
sort of thistle that we call teazle, and these 
teazles were raised, she said, to be sent to the 
manufacturing towns, for the dressi?ig of cloth, 
in which they are used, I believe, to give the 
cloth a fine nap, which operation the French 
call chardoner, that is to say, to thistle it, or, 
to scratch it with a thistle* 

5/. There are some few vines near Saint 
Just, and some in the neighbourhood of Cler- 
mont, a little town on the river Oise, a fine 
clear river, where they climb up the fruit trees, 
and look very ornamental growing in this way. 

58. Chantilly, an ancient little place, and 
formerly the seat of much nobility, is a ma- 
nufacturing town, with a fine canal running 



44 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

by it. The manufacture i?, principally, of 
linen. Luzarches (formerly a country resort 
of the famous Rosseau,) has also some manu- 
facture belonging to it, of lace. I do not 
wonder that Rosseau should have been at- 
tached to this part of the country (comparing 
it with all that which I have passed through), 
for it certainly is very pretty. There is, be- 
tween Laigneville and Chantilly, a pretty 
village called Crai, which is also, I believe, on 
the river Oise, as well as Clermont ; and ano- 
ther village called Lamorlai, near Luzarches. 
These places are all very prettily situated ; 
though I cannot say much for the habitations 
of the people, which have no signs of taste or 
neatness about them. 

59. I saw a man coming out of Clermont 
with a load of fagots. The price of these, he 
informed me, was 40 francs for 50 fagots : he 
having then 50 fagots on his cart, which made 
a good load for two strong horses. 

CO. In coming from Clermont to Ecouen, 
there is much wood on the sides of the road, 
and some locust trees, evidently planted by 
hand. I had a fine morning; but got to 
Ecouen just before the fall of a heavy rain, 
which came on this evening. 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 45 

Paris, Saturday Noon, 18 Oct. 
61. At Ecouen there is a fine castle, built 
about three hundred years ago by the Due de 
Montmorency. I met with the steward of 
the estate last evening, while at Ecouen, and 
I went early this morning„on my road to Paris, 
to see him at the castle, as he had invited me 
so to do. This gentleman showed me all over 
the castle, a fine old building, in the Dutch 
style. He pointed out to me, as we went from 
one part of it to another, the signal alterations 
that it had undergone during the Revolution, 
accompanying his observations with many 
shrugs of regret on account of those effects, 
and as many expressions of devotedness to the 
royal family of his master, the present posses- 
sor of the castle, who is the Due de Bourbon. 
The chapel of the castle is a beautiful little 
place. It occupies one corner of the castle, 
which is a very large building, comprising, 
within its own extent, an open space, of a 
square shape, and of about thirty square yards. 
The castle has a sort of fortification round it, 
so that, to enter the square, you have to pass 
over a bridge, which is the only way of admit- 
tance. On one side of the castle, you look, 
from a terrace, immediately over the town of 
Ecoueu and the neighbourhood, which lie be- 



46 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

neath its site ; and on the opposite side the 
building is sheltered by a very pretty coppice 
of hazel, beech, and chestnut, with many of 
the locust tree, of which there is a good deal 
about the town of Ecouen. I do not know 
whether these trees are precisely what the 
Americans call the locust. They are not, how- 
ever, the rose acacia, but one of the larger 
species, though none of them have arrived at 
any considerable size ; and they seem to be of 
a kind more diminutive than the true locust. 

62. When I got to Ecouen, I found the 
ostler at the inn quite drunk. This is the first 
person that I have seen, in France, so far 
under the influence of liquor. He was not, 
however, a Frenchman; but a German, as I 
was told by the landlady. 

63. The land, between Ecouen and Paris 
(a good stiff soil) is, for the most part, em- 
ployed for the cultivation of vines, and in the 
raising of vegetables for Paris market. The 
people here were gathering grapes into bas- 
kets, and then putting them into little wooden 
vats, ready for the first process of making the 
wine. 

64. The roads, all the way from Calais to 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DB FRANCE. 47 

Paris, are very good ; though not so even as 
those made by the hard-used "paupers," who 
crack the stones to make our roads in England. 
From Saint Omers to Pernes, and from Saint 
Just to Paris, the middle of the road is paved, 
leaving room, on each side of the pavement, 
for a carriage to pass. The paving is done 
.with a sort of stone, which is found along with 
the limestone, like what w T e call burstone in 
England. 



Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday; 
19, 20, & 21 Oct. 
65, As I pass but three whole days in this 
city, it cannot be expected that I should be 
very particular in my notice of it here. It is 
said, that Paris contains a population of 750,000 
souls. Nevertheless, it is, compared with 
London, almost a small place. It is about a 
fourth part the size of London : not a bit more, 
I am certain, if you include the environs of 
both places. On entering the busy part of the 
city, you see very little difference, in its con- 
struction, between it and the city part of 
London, that is to say, Fleet Street, Cheapside, 
Lombard Street, and the rest of those streets 
in London, in which there is so much passing, 
and so much difficulty to pass. The houses 
are high, and the streets are narrow. There 



48 A niDE IN FRANCE. 

are not, as in London, any separate pavements 
for foot-passengers to go upon : so that, on this 
account, the general confusion of the streets 
is even greater than that which is observed in 
the streets of London. There are scarcely 
any fine streets. Nothing like the west-end of 
London : no straight, broad streets, with fine 
houses, throughout, all of one order and size. 
—The river Seine, which passes through the 
town, so as to divide it into nearly two equal 
parts, has fifteen bridges, crossing it from one 
part of the town to the other, just as London 
Bridge crosses the Thames to communicate 
with the Borough of Southwark. One of 
these bridges is, I believe, built upon the 
principle discovered by Mr. Paine. It is 
made of iron; and, from the style of its con- 
struction, looks very light and elegant. — Paris 
is not so black as London is, owing to the use 
of wood-fuel instead of coal, 

66. I have seen nothing in England to equal 
some of the buildings here. Except the public 
buildings, there are few that have any gran- 
deur about them; but some of the palaces 
here are very fine. We have nothing in 
England to be compared with the Tuileries, 
which is the habitation of the King, and 
which, though in the middle of the city, has 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE PRANCE 49 

a spacious and beautiful park in front of it. 
The Palais du Luxembourg, in which is the 
Chamber of Peers, is a palace, nearly as grand 
in itself, with a garden, or park, even finer 
than that of the Tuileries. The Tuileries is 
about ten times as capacious, and full ten 
times as grand, as the palace of our King in 
Pall-mall. The palace called the Louvre is 
little more than an enlargement, or a con- 
tinuation, of that of the Tuileries; but it is, in 
itself, a noble building, though not yet finished. 
The greater part of the Louvre Was built by 
Buonaparte, who was the projector of it; 
and the scaffolding, erected to complete it, is 
now rotting as it stands ; because the present 
disposers of such places do not like the idea 
of finishing a job which was begun under the 
direction of a person of so obnoxious a name. 
The Palais de Justice is a beautiful building, 
of modern structure, but not of such reverend 
aspect as the buildings of Westminster Hall and 
Guild Hall. The. Palais Roy ale, originally the 
palace of, and built by, Cardinal Richlieu, 
and which was confiscated during the Great 
Revolution, is now a sort of market-place for 
all sorts of fashionable merchandize. It forms 
a large square, the interior space of which is 
a favourite resort for promenade; while the 
great range of building is divided into coffee- 

D 



50 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

houses, milliners' and tailors' shops, shops of 
t?inhet-sellers, and the like. The inner parts 
of some of the churches are very magnificent ; 
but I see no churches in Paris, excepting that 
of Notre Dame, which is the metropolitan 
church, to equal some of our ancient cathe- 
drals in external appearance. The Museum 
of Natural History (the only one of the mu- 
seums in Paris that I have seen), and the 
collection of live animals, are superior, by far, 
to any thing of the kind that we have in 
England. The famous Garden of Plants, 
{Jar din des Planies), is, I am told, well worthy 
of the esteem in which it is held ; but, it is 
not, however, any thing like so beautiful a 
place as Kew Garden, either in point of its 
laying out, or of its plantations of trees. One 
great recommendation to this garden is, that 
it is open to the inspection of every one ; as are, 
also, both the two former institutions. — The 
Corn Market, (Halle aux Grains), is a good 
large solid building, situated in the middle of 
the city. It is, in form, just like the cupola 
or dome of St. Paul's Cathedral ; that is to say, 
round at its base, and rising up into the shape 
of one half of a perfect oval. 

67. Almost the whole of the buildings in 
Paris are made of a soft sandy stone, which 



PROVINCE OP ISLE DE FRANCE. 51 

they cover over with a white plaster, or ce- 
ment. The stones that form the walls are 
rough, and not regular in shape or size ; but 
the cement, which is laid smooth over the 
outside of the walls, and then scored with a 
trowel into square or oblong shapes, makes 
the houses appear as if they were composed of 
a solid white stone ; and as there is no black 
smoke arising from the fuel made use of by 
the inhabitants, the city (like the. country 
towns, which are generally built of the same 
material) has, at a distance, a much brighter 
look than that of London, or any of our prin- 
cipal towns in England. 

68. In the Garden of Plants I saw a spe- 
cimen of a new invented thatch, for the roofs 
of dwelling houses or out-buildings. It was, 
in fact, nothing more than an imitation of the 
beehive, the straw being laid on across the 
skeleton of the roof, in little handfuls at a 
time, one u,pon another, each being separately 
bound round tight with a piece of rope-yarn, 
or some of the bark of brambles. The straw, 
after being laid on in this manner, must be 
covered by a thin coat of lime plaster, to turn 
the weather. This mode of covering a roof 
would be a great saving in straw ; neverthe- 
less, I think the old fashioned way of thatch- 
d2 



52 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

ing, without the coat of plaster on the outside, 
is more neat and handsome, by far. 

69. The land just round Paris consists in 
vineyards, or in gardens full of various sorts of 
vegetables for the market of Paris, and walled 
gardens, for the cultivation of peach, apricot, 
nectarine, and plum-trees. There are very 
few fences made use of, besides the walls, 
which are built for the trees to grow against; 
and many of these walls, though close by so 
large a place as Paris, are built quite in the 
open, at a distance from a*iy house, not en- 
closing a piece of ground, but merely one line 
of ivall; so that, if the people passing were 
inclined to steal the fine fruit that grows in 
this way, they might, without hinderance ; 
nevertheless, the gardeners (who garden for 
profit) do not find any reason to apprehend 
such depredation. 

70. At a league from Paris, at a village 
called Montreuil, there lived a gentleman, 
nearly a century back, of the name af Girar- 
dot, who, by his example, taught the people 
in his neighbourhood the mode of cultivating 
peach-trees and other wall fruit. His house is 
still remaining, but his garden is not. The 
whole village of Montreuil is, however, like 



PROVINCE OP ISLE DE FRANCE. 53 

some other little places in the vicinity of Paris, 
now almost entirely inhabited by people de- 
pending on the cultivation of wall fruit. At 
Montreuil there is about a hundred acres of 
land, every particular half acre, quarter of an 
acre, or half quarter of an acre of which has 
a separate wall to enclose it; so that, the 
quantity of wall fruit that is grown here 
annually must be immense. I went into the 
garden of a Mr. Merielle, who showed me 
how these walls are constructed. They are 
first built up in a rough manner, of the soft 
stone which I mentioned in paragraph 67. 
Then a stiff cement, like that which they 
apply to the walls of the houses, is made use 
of, to fill up all the cavities between the rough 
stones. The cement should be laid thick 
upon the face of the wall, not only to make it 
smooth, but to give a hold to the nails, which 
are to hold the branches and shoots of the 
trees, and which are tacked into this plaster or 
cement* just as we tack ours into the mortar 
between the bricks of our garden walls. On 
the top of the wall there must be made a 
little roof, or projection, of about six inches 
from each side of the top of the wall. This 
roof is easily added to the wall, by the use of 
the same materials as those employed to erect 
the wall itself. The roof is necessary to guard 



54 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

the tree from blight and bad weather. This 
prevention is effected by suspending from the 
roof a sttaw mat, which is made for the ex- 
press purpose, and which, being thus sus- 
pended in front of the tree, forms a perfect 
protection to it when it is in bloom, or at any 
time when danger may be apprehended to it 
from the state of the weather or the season. 
The peaches grown against these walls are 
sold for from one sou to four sous a-piece, ac- 
cording to their size or flavour ; but, all the 
fruit was gone. I came rather too late in the 
season, and could not, therefore, see a spe- 
cimen of it. I saw nothing in the manner of 
training the fruit trees here that was different 
from the manner in which the same trees arc 
trained in England. The peaches here are 
budded generally upon almond-stocks, which 
are preferred to plum-stocks, as being more 
of the same nature as that of the peach itself. 
Some of the peach-trees that I saw were up- 
wards of sixty years old; nevertheless, they 
had, from good management, plenty of young 
wood upon them, and had borne well this 
year. 

71. There is a duty, in the form of a per 
centage, levied upon all articles brought into 
the market of Paris. The duty is not, how- 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 55 

ever, sufficiently heavy to make any con- 
siderable difference in the price of provisions 
of any kind. The money which is collected 
in this way is employed in nearly the same 
manner as are the funds of a corporation in 
England. All towns, of any importance, have 
this regulation attached to them. A little way 
from the walls of the principal towns there is 
a gate, at which those who may be bringing 
any thing to market must stop to have it in- 
spected. Coming into Paris I passed through 
a gate, at which I saw two or three men stand- 
ing, each of them having an instrument in his 
hand which looked much like a kitchen-spit : 
a long sharp piece of iron, with which they 
pierced the loads of hay and straw as they 
came through the gate to market, in order to 
prevent any thing like smuggling, 

72. Paris, compared with London, is, in one 
respect, strikingly different. There are very 
few houses here, that do not appear to have 
been built for some years. New houses are, 
of course, erected, in the place of those that 
fall to ruin from age. But, what I mean to 
say is, that Paris does not seem, like London, 
to increase in size: the number of new build- 
ings in it appear to be very little more, if any, 
than just sufficient to make the town cover 



56 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

the same space of ground as that which it must 
have extended over twenty or thirty years ago. 
There is nothing at all of what, about London, 
they call " a box:" that is to say, a genteel, 
new-fashioned, and miserably inconvenient 
small house, with a very small piece of grass- 
plot, in which there are two or three fancifully 
carved patches of bare earth, for the cultiva- 
tion of some " exotics,'' which, either for the 
want of their native sun, or the want of expe- 
rience in the planter of them, are never seen 
to grow after the time of their being stuck 
into the ground. 

CHAJLLY PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 

(Eleven and a half leagues from Paris, through 

Villejuif, Fromenteazi, Essonne, and Ponthierry.)\ 

Wednesday Night, 22 Oct. 

73. The hotel at which I put up at Paris 

(Hotel de Meurice) belongs to the same person 

as the hotel at which I was in Calais. This is 

the most superb hotel that I ever saw any 

where ; and, like some other establishments 

of the kind here, is supported, almost entirely, 

by the custom of English visitors. I did not 

dine or sup at this place, all the while that I 

stayed in Paris, being abroad the greater part 

of my time, either walking about, or at the 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 57 

house of my friend, who is a gentleman re- 
siding in the city. I shall, however, give the 
particulars of the charges, as far as I had any 
to pay, at the Hotel de Meurice. For break- 
fasting here five days, I paid 10 francs. For 
four nights' lodging, 12 francs. For lights, 1 
franc and 10 sous. For boot cleaning, 1 franc 
and 5 sous. For servants, that is to say, the 
waiter's fee (which was charged in the bill), 
4 fyancs. In all, 28 francs and 15 sous. I 
could not have expected a bill of less serious 
amount, at a place where the accommodation 
was so very good as I found it here. I paid for 
my horse, 14 francs, reckoning the feeding and 
care of him to have been for four days, which 
is at the rate of 3 francs and 10 sous a day. 
At the ordinary hotels or inns in France, a 
traveller's horse will not cost him much more 
than one half of what I paid here for mine. 
My horse has cost me, I think, upon an average, 
about 2 francs a day, on my road from Calais 
to Paris; which is about one third of what he 
would have cost, in a similar situation, in Eng- 
land. In London, a horse, by the week, cost?, 
at livery, 4 francs a day, every thing included; 
and, if he stand for a day or two, as mine did 
at Paris, he does not, including every thing, 
cost less than five shillings a day ; that is to 
say 6 francs. 

d 5 



58 A RIDE IN PRANCE. 

74. The land is good all about Paris, as far 
as I could see. The greater part of the culti- 
vation, for some distance round the city, seems 
to be that of vines, from which, owing to the 
backward season, which has affected this part 
of France as well as England, the grapes are 
not all yet gathered. The grapes of this year 
are not good, compared with those of com- 
mon seasons; they are very small, and will 
not make as good wine as what is generally 
made near Paris. The lovers of wine ought 
to be select as to the years when their stock is 
produced; for the wine of some years is not, 
though from the same ground, nearly so good 
as the wine of other years. 

75. The face of the country, just after com- 
ing to Fromenteau, at about three leagues 
from Paris, forms, I think, the most beautiful 
scenery of the kind that I ever beheld. Just 
as you look over the hill, on one side of which 
is situated the little village of Fromenteau, a 
fine view presents itself to your sight. There 
is a space of perfectly flat land, through the 
middle of which the road is cut, and which is 
about two or three miles square. On one side 
of the road you see fine water meadows on the 
River Orge, and, after getting on to the level 
below, you are surrounded, in every direction, 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 59 

by hills, sloping gently up from all sides of the 
open plain, and covered With vines and fruit- 
trees and plantations and parks, and little vil - 
lages, each having its church and spire, scat- 
tered about among the trees, the foliage of 
which is, at this time of the year, very various 
and rich in hue. This view extends from 
Fromenteau to another little village called Ris. 
On leaving Ris to come to Essonne, which is at 
about another three leagues distant, and situ- 
ated on the river Juine or Essonne, the view of 
the country is still more beautiful. The river 
Seine runs along here, and goes off to the 
left; and, on my right hand, I had to lament 
a like departure of a delightful valley which 
winds across the country away from the road 
I am travelling. I think this valley, as far as 
I was able to follow it with my eye, was the 
very prettiest of all rural scenery that I re- 
member to have seen. It is on the sides of 
hills, like those which were here most ele- 
gantly disposed by nature, that the vine flou- 
rishes most. Here the vines were growing 
finely, and covered almost every hill, as far as 
I could see, except in those places where orna- 
mental trees and orchards gave a variety to 
to this enchanting landscape, which I could 
not lose sight of without congratulating my- 



60 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

self on having seen ie The vine covered hills and 
gay regions of France" 

76. I observe, here, a method of training 
peach trees, and other wall fruit, which I did 
not see at Montreuil. Against some of the 
walls in gentlemen's gardens there are rod?, 
quite straight and round, with the bark left 
on, and about an inch in diameter. The rods 
are placed against the wall, long-ways and 
perpendicular, so as to cross one another, like 
lattice icork, leaving square spaces of about six 
or eight inches. Placed irt this manner, and 
fastened together, the rods form a frame for the 
trees, or vines, to grow against; and as the 
branches and shoots must be kept, by means 
of this frame, from touching the wall, they 
are, perhaps, more healthy than they would 
be, being fastened to the wall itself instead of 
to these rods. 

77* I" the neighbourhood of Paris, particu- 
larly about Fromenteau and Essonne, there 
are some fine gentlemen's seats, or castles. 
The word ca&le is, in French, chateau. But 
by chateau, the French seldom, or never, mean 
a place of defence, but merely a large country 
mansion. The truth is, however, that every 



PROVINCE OF JSLB DB FRANCE. 61 

large country house was, formerly, a place of 
defence. It was generally encompassed by a 
moat, or wet ditch. It had turrets and parapets 
and loop-holes. The same custom prevailed in 
England; but in France it prevailed to a much 
later period; and accordingly the French have 
continued to call their large country mansions, 
castles, which indeed have, in many cases, still 
their ancient appurtenances of turrets and the 
like. There is a great display of good taste 
in the laying out of the grounds belonging to 
country mansions in France, but such places 
are very scarce here compared to what they 
are in England. The vicinity of London is 
overstocked with fine houses, while Paris, 
comparatively speaking, has nothing of the 
kind about it. There seem to be scarcely any 
more large buildings within five leagues of 
Paris than I have seen at fifty leagues from it. 
Almost all of the large establishments of this 
kind appear to have existed for many~ years, 
and have belonged, no doubt, the greater part 
of them, to the nobility that were ejected dur- 
ing the Revolution. The plantations and parks 
that encircle these places in France have been 
l$id out with much taste. There is hardly 
any of that appearance of art which is very 
frequently the case with us in England. A 
gentleman's castle, or country house, here, 



62 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

looks as if it had* been built up amonst the 
trees: not the trees as if they had been planted 
about th6 castle. It is about gentlemen's 
houses only that I have seen any quickset 
hedges, of any consequence, on the road from 
Calais to this place. When I do see these 
hedges they are, in general, kept in very nice 
order. Upon some of the plain lands in Pi- 
cardy, there are, here and there, plantations 
of trees in square patches, of about an acre 
each, with close quick-set hedges to enclose 
them. These plantations have been allowed to 
grow into thick coppice, and are intended, I 
suppose, as a protection to the game, where 
the land Kes so open. 



PUITS DE LALLANDE PROVINCE OF ISLE DE 

FRANCE. 

{Thirteen and a half leagues from Chailly, through 

Fontainebleau, Nemours, La Crosicre, and Fon- 

tenay.) 

Thursday Night, 23 Oct. 

78. Soon after leaving Chailly, to come this 
way, I entered the Forest of Fontainebleau. 
This forest is said to be full twelve leagues 
in circumference, and to contain 84,000 acres 
of woodland. The timber in the forest has 
been well cultivated. There are some fine 
plantations of oaks, planted in rows, now got 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 63 

to be of a large size ; besides plantations of 
various other sorts of trees, quite lately made. 
The beeches and the oaks, especially the latter, 
tower up more here than they generally do in 
England. The timber is much like that of 
America ; taller, and straighter in its growth, 
than the English timber is. 1 think I saw 
some timber in this forest as fine, almost, as I 
ever saw in any wood in America. 

79. The town of Fontainebleau is surrounded 
by its forest, the land of which is very rocky 
and mountainous in places, much resembling 
the wild woodlands of America. You enter 
the town from the forest, and the forest con- 
tinues again on the road which I am travelling. 
The manufactures of Fontainebleau consist, 
principally, in porcelai?ie. The neighbour- 
hood is famous for a fine sort of grape, which 
is called Chasselas de Fontainebleau, This 
place owes its importance, almost entirely, to a 
castle, which was built here a great many 
years ago. The castle, which has been the 
residence of many of the kings of France, is 
yet in very good order, although it is one of 
the most ancient castles that remain in this 
country. 

80. Nemours is a little town on the river 



64 A RIDE IN FRANCS, 

Loing". This river runs, after you leave Ne- 
mours, through some beautiful water meadows, 
which continue along on the right hand side 
of the road, for a whole day's ride. Feeding 
on these meadows I saw a great many cows, 
of a pretty little sort; just such as, in Eng- 
land, we call the French or Alderney cow. 
The kinds of cows that I have seen further back 
seemed to be much mixed ; but, in this part of 
the country, the cows are very distinct in their 
species, as well as very handsome. They are 
small, and of different colours; red, yellow, 
brown, and black, and a mixture of all these 
colours with white. I observed, as soon as I 
began to see these cows, that the butter was 
vastly superior to any I had tasted before ; and, 
upon inquiry, I find that Montargis, a town 
between this place and Briarre, is celebrated 
foi* the goodness of its butter. One of the 
best of these little cows may be bought for 
60 francs. A good farmer's horse here sells 
for 200 or 250 francs ; or, about 81. 

81. I saw a labourer, to-day, on the road, 
who was going to work, having a pickaxe 
upon his shoulder. He told me that he 
could get, at this time of the year, 1^ franc 
a-day ; or, 1 franc, the employer finding him 
in food. 



PROVINCE OF ISLE DE FRANCE. 65 

82. There is a good deal of wine made along 
here. The people are yet harvesting the 
grapes. This business would have been about 
finished by this time, had not the untoward- 
licss of the season, even as far South as this, 
had sufficient influence to retard the ripening 
of the fruit. 

S3. I perceive that there are more shep- 
herdesses in this country than there are shep- 
herds. The women and the girls are attend- 
ing the flocks of sheep and herds of cows, and 
the flocks of turkeys, which latter are, here, 
to be seen in great numbers. While they look 
after these animals, assisted by many dogs, 
they are employed, at the same time, in dress- 
ing hemp and flax, and knitting woollen stock- 
ings and gloves. The hemp and the flax they 
afterwards spin, and then sell the yarn, or 
get it converted, by some of their neighbours 
who have looms, into shirts and sheets, and 
various other articles of wearing apparel, and 
articles for domestic use. A great deal of this 
manufacture is going on in all the villages and 
hamlets that I pass by. The weather is now 
beautiful and mild, as it has been ever since I 
got to Paris ; and the women sit outside of 
their houses, in their gardens, or alongside of 
the fields, knitting and spinning, and dressing 
hemp and flax. 



66 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

84. The people, that is to say, the peasantry, 
or country-folks, wear a wooden shoe, which 
they call sabot, and which is made somewhat 
in the same shape as a rough leather shoe, 
there being a strap of leather, round the sole 
of the sabot and over the wearer's instep, to 
keep it on the foot. Towards Calais the sabot 
is not so common, but here it is much more 
commonly worn by the labouring people than 
shoes made of leather are. Some fellow, in an 
English play, execrates the French, because 
they wear wooden shoes. What difference, 
however, is there between these and the nailed 
shoes of our labourers ? The sabot is lighter, 
very little less stiff, and a better security against 
wet. Most excellent things, when you are 
compelled to stand long on wet or damp 
ground. 



BRIARRE — PROVINCE OF GASTINOIS. 

(Twelve and a half leagues from Puits de Lallande, 

through Montargis, La Commodite, Nogent, and 

La Bussiere.) 

Friday Night, 24 Oct. 

85. This morning, as I was leaving Puits de 

Lallande, 1 saw some oxen, which were on 

their way to Paris market. There were three 

different kinds of cattle, which were called, 

after the names of the several parts of the 



PROVINCE OF GASTINOIS. 67 

country in which they are bred, Bourbonnois, 
Lyonnois, and Nevernois. The Bourbonnois are 
of a cream colour, all over ; the Lyonnois are 
white with red spots ; and the Nevernois are 
white, with yellow spots. They are all very 
good looking, though not very large cattle. 
All the kinds were much of one form and size. 
They were grazing cattle, and in excellent con- 
dition ; and they were more like the Scotch 
kilos than any other of our cattle that I can 

compare them to. The price of a new 

plough here, is, as 1 was informed by a wheel- 
wright, about 50 francs ; a cart, /0 francs j a 
wagon, 110 francs, 

86. I see great flocks of fine black turkeys, 
in the stubbles, all along the road. The price 
of one of these turkeys is, about 2 francs ; a 
goose, about the same price ; and a common 
fowl, about 10 or 15 sous; or, 7id« 

87. No crops unharvested, here, except 
some buck-wheat, and a few potatoes. The 
potatoe is not, in France, the same grand 
article of consumption that it is with us. The 
French cut potatoes up into little thin slices, 
and toss them about in a frying-pan. But the 
comparatively small quantity of this sort of 
cookery that they eat, makes it appear more 



68 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

like playing- with potatoes than feeding upon 
them. 



88. The inhabitants of the little towns, and 
the villages, on this side of Paris, are cleaner 
in their dress, and about their houses, than the 
people of Picardy or Artois. The dress of the 
labouring people here is certainly better than 
tbat of the labourers in England ; but, it is not 
so neat nor so clean. The Americans say of 
the French people, that they are pigs in the 
parlour and peacocks in the street. This is a 
thorough saying, to be sure ; it is somewhat 
hyperbolical; but it is not, if I may judge 
from what I have already noticed, wholly un- 
founded in truth. 

89. From Nogent I came over a flat and 
uninteresting district of country, the soil ot 
•which seemed to be any thing but good ; but, 
a very different view is presented, the moment 
you catch sight of Briarre, and the beautiful 
river Loire, close on the border of which are 
situated those farms of Beauvoir, which were 
advertised, in London, by Mr. Hoggart, as 
being so free from all taxes, tithes, and poor- 
rates. 

90. As I approached this neighbourhood, I 



CHATEAU DE BEAU VOIR. 69 

saw a great many chestnut-trees growing on the 
sides of the road. The chestnut is a pretty 
common tree here, though not so much so as 
it is in some other parts of France, where, 
I hear, the peasantry make great use of 
the fruit in the way of food. The chestnut 
tree that I see here is the same as the Spanish 
chestnut. It bears a large nut, which is dry, 
rather bitter, and hard, to eat raw, but very 
good when cooked. It is a good deal different 
from the American chestnut tree, which makes 
finer and taller timber, and bears a nut much 
svreeter than the Spanish chestnut, though 
nothing like so large. 



CHATEAU DE BEAUVOIR. 

Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday; 
25, 2C, 27, & 28 Oct. 

91. This chateau, or castle, is a large man- 
sion, about a mile distant from the village of 
Briarre. The estate, which consists, all to- 
gether, of about 3,500 acres of land, surrounds 
the castle, on one of the banks o£ the Loire, 
upon the eminence of which the castle is 
situated, so as to command a view, for a great 
distance, of the fine river and the valley 
through which it runs. 



70 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

92. A part of the land, about here, is, evi- 
dently, very good. Much of it is very light ; 
but the lighter part of it is not, by any means, 
incapable of yielding a crop. There is a 
variety of soil here : some inclining to a sand, 
and fit for rye, or oats ; and some more of the 
nature of clay, that is to say, stiff, strong 
loam, which will grow good wheat. There is 
a fair distribution of marl, all over the land j 
and a great deal of this is laid upon the land 
as manure. The soil seems kind, as we say, 
to most of the English crops. Wheat* rye, 
barley, oats, vetches, upland-hay, turneps, 
sainfoin, lucerne, and hops : these will ail 
grow here. I have seen some samples of 
wheat and barley and rye, which have been 
produced on this land. The wheat and the 
rye are very good ; the wheat is small, like the 
wheat of America, very clear in colour, and 
firm in substance. The sample of barley, 
which was given to me out of a barn here, 
was certainly a brighter, if not a plumper 
sample, than any I remember to have seen in 
England. The grain is short, very plump, 
and every way excellent. 

93. The finest hay made here, is that of 
lucerne, which is better, they tell me, than that 
of sainfoin; but, both of these are jrowu here 



CHATEAU DE BEAUVOIR. 71 

for hay. I saw some lucerne hay, which was 
given to my horse, and I was told that this hay 
had been made from one of three cuttings 
which a field of lucerne had undergone this 
summer. 

94. They have a method here of sowing 
grain which I never saw before. Neverthe- 
less, I have been told that the fashion belongs 
to Suffolk and Norfolk. The grain is sowed, 
in the usual way, but, instead of being har- 
rowed in upon the flat fallow, the ground is 
ploughed into one bout, two bout, or three 
bout ridges. Most frequently one bout ridges. 
The ploughing prevents any of the grain 
from growing in the space between each ridge, 
so that the crop lies higher, and ha* more 
room to get up in. 

95. For a good distance before I got to the 
Loire, the land, I could see, was much too 
flat for any vines to grow upon it ; but here 
they grow well, all along on each side of the 
river, and some excellent wine is made at this 
place. 

96. From the village of Briarre there is a 
canal which runs, through Montargis, into the 
Seine, whereby there is a direct communica- 



I 



72 A HIDE IN FRANCE. 

tion by water with Paris. This canal is a very 
fine one, and is one of the first things of the 
kind in France. 

97. The price of land here is, in general, 
from 3 to 8 pounds sterling the acre ; and the 
French acre, or arpent, is, according to what I 
learn here, just three-sixteenths of an English 
acre more than an English acre is : that is to 
say, one acre, and three quarters of a rood, 
English measure; or (which is the best way 
of stating it) the French arpent contains (at 
Briarre at least) one hundred and ninety English 
rods, or poles, each pole being sixteen and a 
half English feet square. 

98. Two farmers from Norfolk, who first 
saw Mr. Boggart's advertisement as it was 
quoted in the Political Register, have lately 
been to Briarre, and they had left this place 
just before I got here. They have taken two 
of the farms at Beauvoir, which consist of 
several hundred acres each, at a rent of 10s. 
sterling the acre. The farms have comfortable 
and substantial farm-houses upon them, be- 
sides all the out-houses common to an English 
farm, all of which are in good repair. 

99. The law of Real Estate in France, as far 



CHATEAU DE BKAUVOIR. 73 

as it relates to the power of a foreigner, or 
alien, to become a proprietor of land, is one of 
the matters about which it may be useful for 
me to say something. The law says, that all 
foreigners shall, in this particular, enjoy the 
same privileges in France as would be ex- 
tended to French subjects by the laws of the 
countries to which such foreigners belong. 
Now, then, as to subjects of our King, before 
a foreigner can hold real estate in England, 
Scotland or Ireland, he must be made either 
a denizen, or a naturalized subject,* A denizen 

* Blackstone, in speaking of denizens and natura- 
lized, subjects, gives the following, in definition of the 
difference between the two titles. 

" A denizen is an alien bOrn, but who has obtained 
" ex donatione regis letters patent to make him an 
H English subject; a high and incommunicable branch 
" of the royal prerogative. A denizen is a kind of 
" middle state, between an alien and a natural born 
" subject, and partakes of both of them. He may 
" take lands by purchase or devise, which an alien 
" may not, but cannot take by inheritance ; for. his 
" parent, through whom he must claim, being an alien, 
" had no heritable blood, and therefore could convey 
" none to the son. And, upon a like defect of here- 
«' ditary blood, the issue of a denizen, born before de- 
" nization, cannot inherit to him, but his issue born 
" after, may. A denizen is not excused from paying 
" the alien's duty, and some other mercantile bur- 
" thens ; and no denizen can be of the Privy Council, 

E 



74 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

is created by letters patent from the King ; but 
the title of naturalized subject can be con- 
ferred by Act of the Legislature only. So that, in 
order for an Englishman to possess the right 
of holding real property in France, he must 
(in conformity with the above-mentioned prin- 
ciple of the French law,) obtain either the 
special favour of the King of France, or the 
sanction of the Legislature of that country, in 
the form of an enactment. The Americans 
have settled the matter differently. Any 
Frenchman, or other foreigner, may become a 
citizen of the United States by residing there 
for the space of five years. A residence of five 
years in that country, without asking the leave 

" or either House of Parliament, or have any office 
" of trust, civil or military, or be capable of any grant 
" from the Crown. 

" Naturalization cannot be performed but by 
" Act of Parliament ; for by this an alien is put in ex- 
" actly the same state as if he had been born in the 
" King's ligeance ; except only that he is incapable, 
" as well as a denizen, of being a member of the 
" Privy Council or Parliament, &c. No bill fornatu- 
" ralization can be received in either House of Parlia* 
H ment without such disabling clause in it. Neither 
" can any person be naturalized, or restored in blood. 
" unless he hath received the Sacrament of the Lord's 
" Supper within one month before the bringing in ef 
" the bill ; and unless he also takes the oaths of allegi- 
" ance and supremacy in the presence of Parliament." 



CHATBAU DB BBAUVOIR. 7» 

of any body, entitles a foreigner to all the 
privileges belonging to a natural born citizen ; 
except that alone of being President of the 
United States. In France, consequently, the 
American has a certainty of being able to pos- 
sess real estate ; while an Englishman, who is 
treated by the laws of France, in this respect, 
in a manner according to that in which a 
Frenchman would be treated by the laws of 
England, is in no certainty at all, and must 
depend upon the good will of the King, or 
upon that of the Legislative Body, for the ob- 
taining of the right of holding any property 
that can be called real. The laws of France 
are, then, upon this subject, apparently, more 
indulgent than those of England, as far as re- 
gards such persons as, according to our laws, 
Would be considered foreigners. By the laws 
which existed before the Revolution, the child 
of an alien, born in France, had no more pri- 
vilege than that which belonged to the pa- 
rent as an alien. The laws have since been 
altered, so as to correspond, in this respect, 
with the common law of England. A child 
born of foreign parents in France, as the laws 
novtf are, will enjoy the same rights as a natu- 
ral born subject of that country; provided 
that, when he arrive at his majority (twenty- 
one years of age), he declare it to be his in- 
£ 2 



76 , A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

tention to fix his abode in France, or, in 
case of his residing abroad, still to consider the 
Government of that country as the one to which 
he owes his allegiance. 

100. The bushel of wheat here weighs, upou 
an average, 18* lbs. French weight ; and the 
French pound weight is just equal to eighteen 
English ounces. The French pound weight 
lias, like the English, sixteen ounces; but 
these sixteen ounces weigh just as much as 
eighteen of our ounces. The sack of wheat, 
consisting of eight of these bushels^ weighs 
148 lbs. French weight, and 166^ lbs. English 
weight. This quantity of wheat is now worth 
about sixteen francs. The same sack of rye, 
12 francs; of barley, 11 francs; of oats, 10 
francs. 

101. Now, then, for a comparison between 
these prices and the prices of England. The 
166* lbs. of wheat do not quite make the 
weight of three English bushels. Our wheat 
weighs, on an average, 57 lbs. a bushel, or 
perhaps 58 lbs. Three times fifty-eight pounds 
would be 1741bs.; and w r e have in the French 
sack only 166 J.. There is, then, one twenty- 
fifth less in weight in the French sack than in 
the English three bushels. To purchase French 



CHATEAU DB BEAUVOIR. 77 

wheat being equal in weight to three English 
bushels, that is to say, weighing 174 lbs. Eng- 
lish, would, at the above rate, require 16 francs 
and 13 sous; or, in our money, 13s. 10|<2. 
Therefore, the price of wheat, at this place, is, 
four shillings and sevenpence halfpenny the 
English bushel. The prices of the two coun- 
tries, at this time, placing Mark- Lane against 
Briarre, and taking the English bushel in botli 
cases, will stand thus : — 



MARK-LANE. 




BRIARRE. 




S. 


d. 


S. 


d. 


Wheat - - 6 


3 


Wheat - - 4 


7h 


Rye - - - 3 


6 


Rye - - - 3 


54 


Barley - - 3 


4 


Barley - - 3 


2* 


Oats - - - 2 


n 


Oats - - - 2 


10 


The whole, 15 


H 


The whole, 14 


H 



Thus, though the difference in the prices of 
wheat is very considerable, the difference upon 
the whole is not great ; and, it is upon the whole 
that we ought to build all comparisons of this 
kind. 

102. This is gOod sheep land. They have a 
sheep here called Sologne, or Sologneois (after 
the name of one of the Departments of France), 
which is very generally bred on this side of 
Paris. This sheep, though not handsome or 



78 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

large, is hardy, and makes, they tell me, very 
fine mutton. I see this sort of sheep, as well 
as merinos, on the farms of Beaiivoir. The 
merinos are bred more for the sake of their 
wool than for any thing else, and they seem to 
do well here, although they are a very tender 
sort of stock. The sheep of Sologne, and the 
merinos, are worth, here, from 6 to 10 and 12 
francs a head. 



COSNE PROVINCE OP GASTINOIS. 

(Seven leagues from Briarre, through Neuvy Sw 
Loire.) 

Wednesday, 29 Oct. 
103. Amongst many circumstances to in- 
duce me to stay longer at the Chateau de 
Beauvoir, was the offer of a dog and gun, 
which I should have gladly accepted of, if I 
had not, by the lateness of the season, been 
hurried to get on. This is a fine sporting 
country. There is plenty of game ; and so 
there appears to be generally in France ; for I 
have seen partridges and hares, and people in 
pursuit of them, in almost every neighbour- 
hood that I have passed through. They hive 
here, the English hare, partridge, quail, wood- 
cock, snipe, and rabbit; and, in some places, 



PROVINCE OF GASTINOIS. 7$ 

the pheasant. In addition to these, there is a 
bird, which they call the red-legged partridge ; 
a very beautiful bird, rather larger than the 
commori partridge, and in great abundance 
here. I went a coursing two or three times 
while at Briarre ; and it appeared to me that 
the French hares were quite a match for the 
English grey-hounds that ran after them. 

104. The * GAME LAWS" in France are 
exceedingly simple in their provisions. The 
law that affects sportsmen, is more properly 
a military law than a game law. You may 
chase, and kill, any game that you please, 
without the law's having any thing to do with 
you. But, if you wish to carry a gun, you 
must have a certificate to authorize you to do 
so. Any erne is qualified to purchase this certifi- 
cate ; and the cost of it is fifteen francs, which 
is about ticehe shillings and sixpence sterling. 
The certificate (to procure which it is neces- 
sary, I understand, to show that you have a 
permission to shoot from some person who is a 
landowner to the extent of seventy-five acres) 
is called a portend' armej that is to say, a per- 
mission to carry fire-arms. Having this, you 
may shoot whatever game you please ; but it 
does not give you a right to go on the land of 
another person without having his leave to do 



80 



A RIDE IN FRANCE. 



so, and you are liable, if you go on another 
person's land without such leave, to an action 
for trespass. The soldiers of the king have a 
right to shoot game without any certificate. 
Game may be bought and sold by any body, 
and is bought and sold at all times of the year. 
So, it would appear, that the " Game Laws" 
of France have more an eye to the guns of 
sportsmen, than they have to the preserva- 
tion of those animals which sportsmen love 
to destroy. 

105. The labourers here sometimes catch 
the game in springes, without being either 
whipped, or sent to goal, much less across the 
seas, for so doing. There is> however, little 
to induce them to " poaching," as we call it 
in England. A French labourer would be a 
fool if he could find any delight in prowling 
about in a coppice, at a time when he might 
be*, sleeping at home in such a house as is the 
habitation of a labouring man at Briarrtv 
There are cottages, or small houses, separate 
from the farm-houses, all over the estate of 
Beauvoir. A labourer, employed by the year, 
has one of these houses for his family to live in, 
with from twelve to fifteen acres of land, fire- 
wood, and two cows allowed him ; a little 
piece of vineyard, and apple-trees and pear- 



PROVINCE OF GASTINOIS. 81 

trees, to make wine, cider, and perry for his 
drink. For this little estate he pays 150 francs 
a-year. And he earns, by his labour, from 15 
to 30 sous a-day, according to the season of 
the year ; which would leave him, upon an 
average, after he has paid the 150 francs, more 
than as much as that sum, in clear money. The 
labourers who live under these circumstances 
cannot, generally speaking, be otherwise than 
happy. They have every thing that they can 
want; every thing, in fact, that a labourer 
ought to have. If they like to have beer to 
drink, they have land on which to grow the 
materials for making it ; and they may grow 
the hops and make the malt, without fearing 
the interference of the Exciseman. They have 
- not a farthing of taxes to pay, nor money in 
any other shape, excepting that which they 
pay to their landlord, who gives them a suffi- 
cient price for their labour to enable them to 
preserve comfort and happiness for themselves, 
and to pay him a rent for the advantages 
which he gives them. There is no need of 
" pot-houses," here : and, consequently, there 
are no such things in France. The labourer 
can sit at home in the evening, because in his 
house there is enough of plenty to give con- 
tent ; and, for the same reason, he can go to 
bed, without being afraid of awaking in misery. 
e 5 



$3 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

The state of the French labourer forms, in 
short, a perfect contrast with that of the poor 
raggod creature of the same class in England, 
who, after a hard day's work, slinks into the 
w pot-house" to seek, in its scene of drunken- 
ness and degradation, a refuge from the cheer- 
lessness of his own abode. 

106. The dress of the labourers in France, 
is good. They wear, in all the parts of the 
country that I have yet seen, a smock-frock 
and trowsers, of a blue colour, like the dress 
worn by most of the labourers in the county 
of Sussex. The garments of the Sussex-men, 
however, are very frequently in a state of rag- 
gedness, which is seldom the case with those 
of the French. The men, when at work, 
generally wear some sort of cap upon their 
heads. In this part of the country, I see, they 
wear a hat, which has a very wide brim to it, 
a brim of about eight or ten inches wide, that 
serves as a shelter to the shoulders as well as a 
covering for the head. Sometimes this large 
brim is turned up, in such a way as to form a 
complete cocked-hat, like that which is worn 
by the officers in our army. 

107. When a man is employed, here, in 
threshing wheat or rye, it is a common cus- 



PROVINCE OP GASTINOIS. 83 

torn, as it used to he, I believe, in England, for 
the farmer to pay him by giving him a certain 
portion of the corn threshed, in place of pay- 
ing him for his work in money. 

108. At Beau voir there is some good timber 
land. Timber is much cheaper in France 
than it is in England; but coppice wood of 
oak, at fifteen or twenty years' growth, selis 
for about 500 francs the acre ; or 201. 16s. Sd. 
which is a high price in England. Fagots, of 
a middling size, fit for the heating of an oven, 
sell here for 12 francs the hundred, which is 
not quite Jive farthings each ; and that is very 
cheap. But, I suppose, that a fifteen or twenty 
years oa/c-coppice, yields bark. It is a good 
English coppice that will fetch 10/. an acre at 
ten or twelve years old. 

109. Oak coppices are made here by sowing 
the acorns, in the fall of the year, along with 
wheat or rye, or some other winter crop. The 
acorns are sowed broadcast, as well as the grain 
that is sowed along with them. By the time 
that the crop of grain comes off the ground, 
the oaks get to be two or three inches high, 
and are then allowed to grow into a coppice. 

110. The wine of Beauvoir, which is rather 



84 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

famous in the neighbourhood, is worth 110 
francs the piece, as they call it, which is a 
barrel, containing 250 bottles ; but, then, 
these bottles are large ones, according to the 
wine-measure of France, which is, I believe, 
about one-third larger than the wine-measure 
of England. So that the piece of wine contains 
about eighty gallons, English wine-measure. 
Wine, in general, about here is worth from 60 
to 90 francs the piece. The borders of the 
Province of Burgundy, the name of which is 
so familiar to the ears of the lovers of wine, are 
not further distant than about half a dozen 
leagues from Briarre : so that, the wine made 
at that place is quite as good as a great part of 
the wine of Burgundy itself. 

111. There is a fine farm new offered for 
sale, close by Beauvoir, for 2000 pounds ster- 
ling consisting of 210 acres of arable land, 
some of which seems to be as fine land as any 
former can want. No part of it is bad land ; 
and the farm yields plenty of fuel in its scat^ 
tered trees and its hedge rows. The farm- 
house and out-houses, are all convenient 
enough, and in good repair. This price is but 
9L 10s. b\d. an acre for land freehold and 
tythe-free. The taxes are very light. There 
are assessors appointed by the government, 



PROVINCE OF GASTINOIS. 85 

who lay the tax upon the land here ; and the 
tax so imposed is called the " contribution," 
and is levied, in amount, according to the real 
value of the land. Perhaps an English farmer, 
with his experience in taxation, w r ould suppose 
that the estate of Beauvoir, 3500 acres of land, 
could not be worth much, if he should hear 
that the whole of the taxes levied upon it 
amount to but one hundred pounds sterling 
a-year. Nevertheless, they do not amount to 
any more than that sum. 

112. The climate, of this part of France, is 
of a very pleasant temperature. Peaches and 
apricots grow in the open fields amongst the 
vines, and there is a great abundance of all the 
common sorts of fruit. There is, they tell me, 
very little winter here, and the spring comes 
on full a month sooner than it does with us in 
the south of England. The harvest of this 
year has been backward j but it is, in some 
seasons, entirely finished by the latter end of 
July. It is to this climate that must be attri- 
buted the firie dry wheat, and the bright barley, 
which I saw at Beauvoir. We have a great 
deal of land in England much richer than any 
that is to be found in this neighbourhood ; but, 
for the want of a climate like this, we can 
never depend upon having such fine crops, as, 



86 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

in this part of France, where there is no blight 
of any kind, and where the weather for the 
banyest is almost always fair from beginning 
to end, a farmer is pretty sure of reaping. 

113. This place, Cosne, is a little town, 
situated upon the banks of the Loire, and at the 
mouth of the river Novain. There is a good 
deal of hard-ware manufacture belonging to 
it, in which, I understand, many Englishmen 
are employed. Iron foundery, and cutlery, 
a.re the two chief branches of the business, for 
the latter of which the town has become 
famous. The French are very poor, compared 
to us, in all sorts of cutlery ; but at Cosne they 
have got some Englishmen to assist in bring- 
ing this article of manufacture towards per- 
fection. 

114. The house at which I stop at Cosne 
happens to be kept by a brewer, Who spoke to 
me of the hops grown at Beauvoir, which, he 
said, were worth 1 franc a pound. I tasted 
some of the beer brewed here : it was very 
good beer, and sells for 5 sous (about 2^d.) 
the bottle, which holds nearly a quart. 

115. I was sorry to find, when I arrived at 
Briarre, that the vintage, at that place, had 



PROVINCE OF GASTINOIS. 8? 

been all finished a day or two before. Upon 
inquiry at Cosne, however, I found that 1 was 
not too late to see something of the process of 
making wine. The vintage, they tell me, is 
full a month later this year, than it has hitherto 
been in ordinary seasons. 

116. The bunches of grapes are cut from 
the vines by means of a pair of scissors. They 
are then put into large baskets, which the 
gatherers carry to one side of the vineyard, 
and there the grapes are tipped into tubs, 
placed ready for their reception. The tubs, 
when filled, are carried home in a cart or 
wagon, and the grapes are then, while in the 
tub, pounded or bruised, by a stout and pretty 
heavy piece of wood, which is made use of by 
hand. From the tubs, the grapes are thrown 
into a very large vat, as soon as they are suffi- 
ciently bruised. In this vat the pulp of the 
bruised grapes, and their juice, all together, 
remain for as much as a week or ten days, 
covered over, as beer is when set to work, in 
order to undergo the fermentation that is ne- 
cessary. While this fermentation is going on, 
the pulp and juice in the vat rise up, just as 
bread does that is made of yeast. After rising 
up and frothing for some time, the head sinks, 
as that of beer does ; and then the fermenta- 
tion is supposed to be nearly at an end. As 



88 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

soon as this sinking takes place, the juice that 
flows in the vat is drawn off, leaving the pulp, 
and the juice which that still retains, behind. 
The juice thus drawn off, is considered to 
make the best wine of the vintage. When 
this juice is drawn off, all that which remains 
in the vat is taken out and pressed in the wine- 
press. The juice runs away, from the press, 
into a large tub sunk in the ground, from 
which it is emptied, directly, into the piece, 
or barrel. There is nothing at all mixed with 
the juice of the grape ; and, from the time 
that it is first put into the barrel, it remains 
there, until it is drawn off to bottle. The 
bung-hole of the barrel, after receiving the 
juice, must be left open, covered only by a 
vine-leaf, for about ten days, in order that all 
fermentation may subside before the barrel be 
made close for good. — This is the whole pro- 
cess of the vintage, as far as relates to the 
red-wine. That of the white-wine is some- 
what different. The white grapes must be 
pressed directly after they have been bruised, 
and, instead of fermenting in the vat, pulp and 
juice mixed all together, like the red- wine ; 
the white wine must not be allowed to fer- 
ment till it have undergone all the pressing 
and separation of the pulp from the juice. 
It must be bruised, pressed, and put to fer- 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 89 

ment in the barrel, without there being" any 
lapse of time between these different stages of 
the process. The reason for this is, that if the 
white wine were to be allowed to ferment, like 
the red, when its juice is mixed along with the 
pulp of the grapes and their stalks, the pulp 
and the stalks would spoil the colour of the 
wine; and the wine would not, in fact, be 
white wine at all. 



COUPOIS PROVINCE OF BERRY. 

{Eleven and a half leagues from Cosne, through 
Pouilly and La CharitL) 

_ Thursday Night, 30 Oct. 
117. The bill, which I paid this morning, 
at Cosne, came to 4 francs and 10 sous. — I 
supped, last night, in company with two per- 
sons, one of whom was the driver of what the 
French call a voiture de roulage ; that is, a 
heavy cart, or two-wheeled carriage, which is 
used in France to convey all sorts of goods or 
merchandize, from one part of the country to 
another. I might, if I had chosen so to do, 
have supped alone ; but, I have made it a 
point to mix with the various classes of com- 
pany that I meet with in this way. as much as 



90 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

possible. It is necessary for a traveller to do 
this, if he would become acquainted with the 
real character of the people. This driver of a 
roulage, although not a person, perhaps, of the 
most refined conversation^ was one, neverthe- 
less, in whose company there was none of that 
coarseness which shows itself so generally in 
the company of those who, in point of rank, 
would be upon a level with him in England. — 
The supper consisted of some roasted fowls; 
and some little fish fried, which were caught, 
I was told, in the Loire : they are called gud- 
geons here ; and are very small, but very good. 
Besides this, there was a ragout made, I think, 
of beef; some peaches, apples, and grapes, by 
way of dessert; and as much wine as we chose 
to drink, of which two or three bottles were 
emptied, in great good humour, by my com- 
panions at table. 

118. Pouilly and La Charite, are both 
situated on the banks of the Loire, in the road 
from Briarre towards Lyons. Both of. these 
places are in the province of Nevernois, which 
I entered on leaving Cosne, and left, again, 
just on th*s side of La Charite\ At La Charitt' 
I cross the Loire, to come to this place, and 
go directly away from the bank of this side 
of the river. The Population of La Charite 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 91 

is about 4000, and that of Pouilly nearly one 
half as many. 

119. On the other side of the Loire, after 
coming from Briarre, on the road to La 
Charite, the country is flat and uninteresting, 
excepting just in the neighbourhoods of Pouilly 
and La Charite\ Both these two places are 
surrounded by hills that are covered with 
vines, and that slope down to the brink of the 
river. The view all around Pouilly is beau- 
tiful ; but, generally, as I came along the road 
from Briarre to La Charite, I could see that 
the opposite bank of the Loire, so far, was 
much the most rich and highly cultivated of 
the two. La Charite' is an ancient looking 
place. There is a church in the town, which 
has a convent attached to it ; both of* the 
buildings are still in pretty good repair, but 
seem to be very old. 

120. Coupois is a place of one house only, 
which is a stage-inn, or place at which to 
change horses, or lodge, upon the road. The 
house is in a delL between two mountains 
that are covered with oak wood, and is what is 
here called the Poste mix Chevanx, which 
means post-horse-house. There is one of this 
kind of inns, at every few leagues, on all 



92 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

the posting roads in this country. It is situated 
most commonly, in a town or a village ; but, 
in cases where there are no considerable num- 
ber of houses together for a good distance, as 
it is, for instance, in the case of Coupois, you 
meet with the inn in a lone situation. The 
Poste aux Chevaux is where the diligence al- 
ways changes horses. The words, " Poste 
Royale" (royal post-house), are generally 
written on the sign of the house. It is licensed 
by the government, which manages such 
matters with great precision. There is al- 
lowed to be but one inn of the kind in any 
town. The diligences all stop at that one 
place ; although, in many cases, there may be 
a dozen or more inns in the town besides. 
The Poste mix Chevaux is, almost in every 
case, the public house of best accommodation 
that is to be met with upon the road. 

121. There is nothing worth noticing in the 
country from La Charite to this place, five 
leagues distance, excepting a little hamlet, 
called Sansarge, a pretty little place, which is 
not far on this side of La.Charite\ 

122. Throughout all my journey from Calais 
to Paris, and from Paris to La Charite", I have 
been travelling upon two of the principal roads 



PROVINCE OF BiiRRY. 93 

in France. From Paris to La Charite I came 
along the main road to Lyons; but after cross- 
ing the tfoire I get into what may be called al- 
most a cross-country road. The greater part 
of the travellers that I have met on my way 
from Calais to Paris, and thence towards 
Lyons, have been English people, excepting 
those who travel by diligence, or coach. By 
travellers, I mean persons travelling in their 
own carriages. 1 have seen a great many 
English people travelling with fine English 
carriages and horses ; but very few of the 
French have I seen with any thing like an 
equipage. Within the city of Paris, even, 
there are very few persons that ride in their 
carriages, compared to what there are in 
London. 

123. The country inns in France are a good 
deal like the inns in America. The business 
of the house is by no means altogether con- 
fined to the entertainment of the guests. The 
landlord is frequently a farmer as well as an 
inn-keeper ; and his house and the buildings 
belonging to it, answer more the description 
of those of an English farmer than of one of 
our inn-keepers. The landlady here super- 
intends and takes an active part in the cook- 
ins:, and all the other sorts of work that are 



94 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

going on in the house. There are a greater 
number of people employed, very often, in an 
inn here, than there would be in one that has 
as much custom in England ; but the employ- 
ment of these people is of a more various kind. 
The ostler is frequently a carter as well as a 
servant to look after the horses of strangers : 
the women servants spin, dress hemp and 
flax, and attend to the rearing of large flocks 
of poultry, and get them ready to send to 
market. The chambermaid, or even the land- 
lady herself, in many cases, knows as well how 
to tie up a traveller's horse, and to give him a 
feed of corn, as if she had been accustomed to 
the office of ostler. There are very few per- 
sons travelling upon the roads here to what 
there are in England; and it is for this reason, 
I suppose, that the business of entertaining and 
providing for travellers is so frequently con- 
nected with the various sources of profit that 
belong to the land. 



BOURGES — PROVINCE OP BERRY. 

{Six leagues from Cupois.) 

31 October. 
124. The winter appears to be approaching 
this part of the country. They told me, at 
Briarre, that there had been no cold weather 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 95 

before I came there. The weather was beau- 
tiful all the while I remained at that place ; 
but yesterday and to-day have been wretchedly 
bad. I was glad to get to Bourges, out of a 
cold and cutting rain, in which I thought that 
six leagues ride was quite enough. 

125. The city of Bourges, which is the ca- 
pital of this province, is a good-sized place, 
and is situated upon the rivers Auron and 
Yevrette; its population is upwards of 1 6,000. 
The manufactures of Bourges are, woollen 
cloths, sail-cloth, cutlery, and saltpetre. 

126. Two gentlemen, with whom I supped 
at Coupois last night, spoke to me of the cathe- 
dral of Bourges, which I went to see as soon as 
I got here. It is a beautiful specimen of gothic 
architecture ; but the revolution seems to have 
handled it very roughly. The cathedral at 
Amiens is in a much better state of preservation, 
and is, on that account, thought more of than 
the cathedral at Bourges. It is the tower of 
this cathedral, and the figures and devices 
that ornament the principal entrance to 
the building, in which its chief beauty con- 
gists. The groupes of figures over the door 
porches, which are intended to represent diffe- 
rent parts of scriptural history, and the sta- 
tues of saints, have been sadly battered about. 



96 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

A great many of the saints, like those of St. 
Bertin, at St. Omers, have lost their heads or 
arms, or legs, while others have been totally 
knocked away from the face of the building. 
The archbishop belonging to this cathedral, 
has an ancient and fine large palace, which 
stands close by it. He seems, I think, to in- 
habit but a small portion of his palace, and 
not to be rich enough to keep the rest of it in 
repair; for, the greater part of the windows 
in it are so bare of glass as to render the apart- 
ments not fit to live in. 



ST. FLORENT PROVINCE OF BERRY. 

{Four leagues from Bourges.) 

Saturday Noon, 1 Nov. 1823. 
127. When I got to Bourges, yesterday, I 
found that the inns in the place were almost 
all full of Spanish officers, prisoners of war, 
who were either quartered there for some 
time, or going through. I could not get a 
room to myself at all ; and I was obliged to 
sleep in a room where some of these Spanish 
officers slept also. I was not a little asto- 
nished to find, that one of these gentlemen 
smoked a segar as he laid in bed ! This morn- 
ing presented a sad look-out for a traveller : 
rain and cold. Nevertheless, I did not like 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 97 

the thought of breathing some more tobacco- 
smoke in my sleep ; so, I encountered the 
weather, and came off to this little village of 
St. Florent. 



SUNDAY NIGHT, 2 NOV. 

128. Having no company to smoke me out, I 
remained all this day at St. Florent, on account 
of the weather, which was very stormy and 
unpleasant. 

129. At the inn at which I am here, which 
is but a small one, I see more to induce me to 
think that the French are no Pythagoreans ; 
that is to say, that they do not like vegetables 
better than meat. While I sat by the kitchen 
fire last night, I saw three Frenchmen at their 
supper. One of them appeared to be a farmer, 
and the other two were both labouring men. 
They made (as it appeared to me) a very 
hearty meal, upon two or three sorts of stews, 
or fricassees, that had been placed before them : 
but, they afterwards ate one half of a goose, 

CHATEAUROUX PROVINCE OF BERRY. 

I Ten and a half leagues from St. Florent, through 

Essoudun) 

3 Nov. 

130. A great change of weather took place 

last night ; and I started, this morning, upon 



yb A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

ground that was frozen pretty hard. This is 
the first frosty weather that I have had. 

131. The city of Chateauroux, the popula- 
tion, of which is 8000, is the capital of the 
Department called Indre, and is situated on 
the river of that name. There are manufac- 
tories here for coarse cloth, fulling, and. the 
making of 'parchment. I see nothing in the 
way of buildings, of any importance, at Cha- 
teauroux, excepting the ruins of a fine old 
church (just opposite to the inn where 1 lodge) 
which are now made use of as a brewery. 

132. From this city I turn again towards 
home ; so that this place, which is, as near as 
can be, in the centre of France, and at about 
four hundred miles from Calais, will be the 
extremity of my little tour. 

133. Essoudun is a town of about the 
same size as Chateauroux, situated on the 
river Theols. At this place they bleach a 
good deal of cloth, and manufacture parchment 
and paper. 

134. As I was upon my road from St. Fio- 
rent towards Essoudun, I saw a great number 
of well-dressed country people coming, from 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 99 

all quarters, to a fair, which was held at a 
little village through which I passed. A great 
part of them appeared to be going for plea- 
sure merely ; but many of them were taking 
cows, asses, goats, and sheep to the fair to 
sell. I took particular notice of the sheep : 
they were all merinos, and the smallest and 
poorest animals of the sheep kind that I ever 
saw. Many of them could not have weighed 
more than Jive pounds a quarter, 

135. The country I have passed over to-day 
is much the same as all that between LaCharite* 
and St. Florent. Excepting just round the 
towns, where I see vineyards, with peach-trees 
andother fruit-trees growing amongst the vines, 
the country consists of one large plain, with 
now and then a wood of beech or oak. This 
plain land is all in cultivation, and seems to 
be, generally, good land. There is a great 
deal of stone under the surface of this plain 
land. I do not know what sort of stone it is ; 
but they make great use of it in repairing the 
roads. I see that the men, who make the 
roads here, and who are appointed by the go- 
vernment for the purpose, crack the stones 
always before they put them upon the roads. 
These men wear a sort of uniform cap, as a 
sign of their employment, as road makers. 



100 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

136. It appears tome, that the newly-adopted 
mode of making our roads in England, must 
have been borrowed from the French, The 
shape of the main roads here is exactly that 
in which our turnpike-roads have heen made 
of late. The materials to repair them are 
laid on in the same manner ; and the instrument 
made use of to crack the stones here, a sort of 
long-handled sledge-hammer, is precisely the 
same as that made use of with us. 

137. In this part of France they use many 
oxen in harness. I saw some oxen at work 
at Briarre. They are not made to draw 
(as oxen are in England, or in America) from 
the shoulder, but from the horns. There is a 
slight wooden beam, to the centre of which 
the chain of the plough, or the pole of the 
wagon or cart is affixed. The beam is placed, 
each end of it, across the poles of two oxen 
which are abreast, so as to come close to the 
back part of their horns. Then a leather tie 
is brought round the front part of their horns, 
and both ends of the tie are fastened together 
round the beam. And thus the animals draw 
along the weight that is intended to be re- 
moved. I remember a book published by 
Lord Somerville, inculcating the making of 
oxen draw by the horns. I remember that 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 101 

the plates amused me very much. I admired 
his Lordship's invention 1 " No tricks upon 
travellers'' is an old saying. — I heard a far- 
mer in England say, that he did not ap- 
prove of oxen, in general use, upon a farm. 
He said he found that, when he had oxen 
at work, they fell away, because, said he, 
they had not time enough to chew their cud! 
This was certainly a sufficient argument to 
show that oxen should not be worked by 
him. The French farmers say, that oxen are 
very useful. They are, in France, very tract- 
able and laborious animals ; and do, some 
how or other, find time enough to chew their 
cud into the bargain. The truth is, that the - 
English farmer himself* as well as his oxen 
or other working cattle, has a great deal 
more to do than the farmer here has. Farm- 
ing, in France, is not the same bustling, 
money-making business, that it always has 
been in England, as long, at any rate, as I 
can remember any thing about it. The far- 
mer here has, like the American farmer, very 
little anxiety about him. His fortune, or wel- 
fare, does not seem to be so uncertain as it is, 
more or less, with the greater part of our ac- 
tive farmers. In the character of a French 
farmer there is not that indefatigable pursuit 
of his employment, without which, in England, 



102 A RIDE IN FRANCB. 

a farmer cannot get on. The English farmer 
is full of care : he cannot do without money, 
and, to make that, work must be "done by 
somebody. The French farmer has less to do 
with money. Comparatively speaking, he has 
scarcely any call for money. The demands 
upon his purse are not so large and so fre- 
quent : and, consequently, his strivings to ob- 
tain money are not so unremitting and so la- 
borious. His land is cultivated with less 
anxiety to himself ; and if the oxen that turn 
it over fall away, it is not for want of time 
enough to chew their cud. There are no 
"gentlemen farmers'' in France. There are 
no farmers here that do not, with their own 
hands, do some part of all the work that is 
done upon their farms. A farmer, in France, 
works at the head of his men ; and, while in 
the fields, he does not, in his dress, seem to 
he any thing more than a foreman in the bu- 
siness about which he is engaged. In short, 
to say " gentleman farmer " in French, would be 
incongruous : it would be putting two words 
together which would have, in such conjunc- 
tion, no meaning ; no sort of practical sense. 

138. A great part of the ploughing, and 
other ordinary work upon a farm, in this part 
of France, is done by mules and asses, parti- 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 103 

cularly by the latter of these animals, which 
are here in very general use. I cannot see 
so many of these patient, gentle, laborious, 
useful, and cheaply-kept animals, without 
thinking of the just, the feeling, the beautiful 
eulogium pronounced on them by Bcjffon ; 
nor can I behold the kind manner in which 
they are treated in France, without reflecting 
with shame on the treatment they almost 
always receive in England, where the owners 
of them seem, in general, not to have more 
feeling for them than they have for pieces of 
stone or of wood. To make positive laws to 
reach the crime may be difficult ; but, there 
can be no doubt, that, in the eye of morality, 
an act of common theft is less criminal than 
it is to load one of these animals until it be 
ready to sink under the weight ; till its limbs 
tremble and, its spine bends ; and then to beat, 
to goad, and to lacerate it for not advancing 
with speed. 

139. The French are much more gentle in 
their treatment of all tame animals than we 
are. I must observe, however, that, while they 
do no not drive their oxen, for instance, so 
hard, they are not so much inclined to work 
hard themselves. The best horses that run in 
the diligences here, are almost as rough in their 



104 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

coats as our forest poneys are ; but they do 
not get knocked about as our coach-horses 
do. The sleekest of our coach-horses would, 
I dare say, if he could speak for himself, rather 
belong to the diligence than to the English 
stage-coach. In the former of these concerns 
he would be oftener washed than he would 
be well brushed ; but he would lead a much 
easier life. — J never knew a French sportsman 
with a starving dog : with an English sports- 
man I have rarely seen a well-fed one. 

140. I see that there is very little variety in 
the mode of cultivating the vine in France, as 
far as I have gone through the country. In 
all the vineyards that I have seen, the vines 
are planted in rows. The rows are from three 
to four feet apart, and the vines, in the row, 
from two to three feet from each other. The 
vines seldom get up to above four or five feet 
high. They are cut down, in the month of 
February, or thereabouts, very close. There 
is a little of the last year's Wood left, but not 
many inches of it, to give new wood for the 
next season. When they begin to shoot, in 
the Spring, there are stakes, of either round 
or split coppice wood, which are about four 
feet long, and an inch and a half in diameter; 
and one of these stakes is stuck into the ground 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 105 

near the stem of each vine. The stakes are 
intended to give a hold to the tendrils, by the 
means of which the vines climb up, and, thus, 
keep themselves clear from the ground. 



CHATILLON SUR 1NDRE — PROVINCE OF BERRY. 

{Eleven Leagues from Chateauroux, through Bu- 
zancois.) 

Tuesday Night, 4 Nov. 
141. This morning 1 breakfasted at Cha- 
teauroux. 1 had some coffee for breakfast ; 
but the landlord of the inn and his family, 
who had their breakfast about the same time, 
ate soup and drank red wine. Not only did 
they eat soup, but, in the soup there was cab- 
bage : boiled cabbage for breakfast! This 
shows how much habit does for the taste ; for, 
what Englishman would, if he could get any 
thing else, feed upon soup with cabbages in 
it early in the morning? I do not see, how- 
ever, why this cabbage soup (which had plenty 
of bread in it) and the wine, should not be 
about a thousand times better for breakfast 
than the cold potatoes and the tea, which are 
now so fashionable amongst the common 
people in England. 

142 Chatillon sur Indre is a little town, on 

F 5 



106 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

the left bank of the river Indre. Buzancois 
is situated on the right bank of the same river. 
This latter place has a cannon-fcmndry belong- 
ing to it, besides some other iron-works. It 
ought to be, if it be not, celebrated for its 
ugliness. There are not many streets, all to- 
gether, in the little town ; but those that there 
are, are the most crooked, the most narrow, 
and the most dirty of all the streets I have 
ever seen. There are two little villages on 
the road, one on each side of Buzancois : the 
first is called Villedieu, the next Clion. There 
is a good deal of vineyard all about these vil- 
lages, as well as about the town of Buzancois. 

143. At Villedieu there is an old castle, with 
a plantation of trees round it, encircled by a 
stream of water which flows round the pre- 
mises so as to give them the appearance of a 
little island. A great many of the old castles 
and fine country houses in France are now 
tumbling to pieces, for want of somebody to 
inhabit them. They seem as if their day had 
gone by : as if they had belonged to a state of 
things very different from that which now 
exists here. 

144. The river Indre runs, at no great dis- 
tance from the road, all the way from Cha- 



PROVINCE OF BERRY. 107 

teauroux to this place. The river is bordered 
by water meadows, with cows, of the pretty 
little kind I before mentioned, and oxen, graz- 
ing upon the meadows. Some of these oxen 
are almost as good looking cattle as any I have 
seen in England. They are of a middling size, 
but well formed, and seem to be of a very dis- 
tinct, or true, breed. 

145. The labouring people, or peasantry, 
have, generally, cows of their own. Some- 
times one cow, sometimes two or three cows 
belong to one labourer's family. They also 
keep pigs, of their own. The wives or 
children of the labourers attend to the cows 
and the pigs, through the day, during which 
these animals are suffered to rove about, and 
feed on the sides of the roads and lanes. The 
pigs of France are all of one kind, as far as I 
have seen. That kind is not, by any means, 
the most beautiful kind of pig. A great many 
French pigs, of the sort that I see here, were 
taken to England just after the last war. 
They were very long legged and ugly crea- 
tures, to look at, when poor ; but they were 
not, according to the reports of those who 
fattened them, so uncomely when in the shape 
of pork and bacon. 



108 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

CORMERY PROVINCE OF TOURAINK. 

{Ten leagues from Chatillon sur Indre, through 
Loches.) 

5 Nov. 

146. When the French drink each other's 
health, they tap their glasses, one against the 
other, and do so, very frequently, without ac- 
companying the act by any speech. Last 
evening, at Chatillon sur Indre, I saw five or 
six Frenchmen, who appeared to be all me- 
chanics or labourers, drinking wine with the 
landlord of the inn. They all held up their 
glasses together, and each one tapped the 
glasses of all the rest of the company, before 
he drank. It appeared to be a rule of polite- 
ness that they should all drink at one time. 
They talked almost incessantly, and seemed 
to be all talking at once. If one of them hap- 
pened to say a word, just as they were all 
about to drink, all the rest would simul- 
taneously take the glasses from their mouths, 
and fall a gabbling again directly : so that, 
the ceremony of salutation had frequently to 
be repeated four or five times over, before the 
ardour of their conversation would admit of a 
pause in which there was time enough to take 
a draught. This manner of drinking together, 
which I have noticed upon more than one oc- 



PROVINCE OF TOCRAINE. 109 

casion, has a good deal tended to strengthen 
my preconceived notions of the sobriety of this 
people, as far, at any rate, as relates to drink. 
The conversation of Frenchmen is not, to be 
sure, always serious enough to be called sober. 
But, there was a something in the putting off, 
the postponement of the draught, which I 
could not help regarding as a sign of sobriety ; 
as a departure from that paramount devotion 
which, in the company of our countrymen, is 
too commonly paid to the bottle. 

147. Loches is a town, on the river Indre. 
The Indre, a little river, is a branch of the 
Loire, and joins the Loire at about half way 
between Tours and Angers, which two places 
are both situated upon the Loire. The popu- 
lation of Loches is between 4000 and 5000. 
Its manufactures are, woollen cloth, cotton cloth, 
and paper. There is, I am told, an English 
lady at this place, who has a large manufactory 
of cotton cloth, established and carried on under 
her own direction. 

148, Loches is a most curious old place, 
and is well worthy the examination of stran- 
gers and travellers, on account of the manner 
in which a great part of its houses are si- 
tuated and made. The town stands round the 



110 A RTDE IN FRANCE. 

slope or declivity of a higli mountain. The 
mountain is, I believe, an entire rock, excepting 
on the surface, where there is a stoney and 
good soil, such as the vine likes best to grow 
in. The houses, of the manner of making 
which I am speaking, are excavations in the 
solid rock, or hard stone, which composes the 
body of the mountain. After having made a 
hole in the rock, sufficiently large to form a 
dwelling, they build up a wall, in front of the 
hole, with a part of the materials cut out in 
the excavation. In the wall the window- 
places and the door-way to the house are left 
open. But it is not absolutely necessary to 
have any building, in the making of this sort 
of house ; for I see, in many cases, houses 
made in the rock, in such a way as to leave a 
front wall of solid stone ; and this is done, by 
hewing away, in the front of the rock, only 
such places as will be wanted to be open for 
doors or windows, and so completing the rest 
of the cavity inside, without removing the 
front part of the rock, which is, in general, 
destroyed, because the building up of a wall 
in its stead is less troublesome than would be 
the hewing of a wall out of the solid rock 
itself. The smoke from the fire-places of 
these houses is conducted through a chimney, 
which is a hole made up through the rock, lo 



PROVINCE OF TOURAINE. Ill 

come out upon the side of the mountain j and, 
on that part of the steep which forms the root of 
the house and place for the outward part of the 
outlet of the chimney, there is, very frequently, 
a turf, with a growth of high trees and bram- 
bles to surmount and ornament the whole. 
The stables, cart-houses, and other offices be- 
longing to these dwellings, are all made, in a 
like manner, out of the rock. The vines grow 
exceedingly well in the ground about these 
houses ; and, from the form of the mountain, 
in many instances, the vines might be as well 
cultivated upon the roofs of the houses, as they 
are in the gardens on the level ground be- 
neath. 

149. Between this place and Chatillon sur 
Indre, I saw several women spreading dung 
with their hands ! I have, in many instances, 
in this part of France, seen the hands of the 
softer sex employed in this unbecoming labour : 
some of the women spreading the dung upon 
the land, while others of them were carrying 
it upon their backs in baskets into the fields ! 
Many of my readers, even the most credulous 
among them, will, very probably, give me 
credit for a little romancing, when I publish 
such a relation as this. It is, however, no- 
thing more than is strictly true : it is, in many 



112 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

places, as common a thing for women to be 
thus employed, as it is for almost any kind of 
work to be going on upon a farm. I cannot 
see this, in France, without being reminded 
of "La Politesse Franchise" the boasted polite- 
ness of the French. I have heard that the Ger- 
mans treat their wives with great want of 
kindness and respect ; that they even make 
them clean their horses, and black their shoes. 
But, the Germans are not at all famed for their 
elegance of manners, while Monsieur has made 
us believe that he is the very pattern of polite- 
ness. 1 have asked Frenchmen the reason 
why women, for whose favour they sue in 
terms so flattering and refined, to whom they 
pay their compliments the least dissembling, 
and make the lowest of their most inimitable 
bows ; how it is that women, who, in France, 
are the objects of such unqualified professions 
of attachment and respect, arc obliged to ren- 
der services so improper to the character of 
their sex. It is said, by way of excuse, that a 
great part of the men are engaged abroad; 
that they are soldiers, or belong to the navy, 
or to maritime trade ; that they are not, in 
hort, at home, and, consequently, that the 
men that are left upon the land have not suf- 
ficient strength to cultivate it. This is an ex- 
cuse which does no honour to the makers of 



PROVINCE OP TOURA1NK. 118 

it ; it is, indeed, ho excuse at all ; for, if it were 
admitted as such, Englishmen would have a 
right to exact from their wives and daughters 
just as much as Frenchmen do from theirs ; 
and, yet, they do not, though there must be a 
larger portion of Englishmen abroad than 
there is of any nation in the world. It is 
also said, that it is more agreeable to na- 
ture, and more healthful, for women to be at 
this kind of work, than it would be for them 
to live idle. Such an excuse is equally fri- 
volous and false. What is contrary to nature 
cannot be generally healthful, and, it is quite 
enough to see these women in France, to be 
convinced that Monsieur gives them a vast deal 
more to do than nature and the prevention of 
idleness can require. They are round-shoul- 
dered ; they walk with a step as heavy as that 
of the most awkward of our plough-boys ', 
their faces are very much sun-burned, and 
their features are so hard that they scarcely 
look like women : the muscular form of their 
bare and brown arms, in particular, shows, 
that the oppressive sway to which they are 
obliged to submit, is such as effectually to de- 
grade them, and such as must imply unman- 
liness as it touches the character of those 
who bear that sway. I ought not to pass 
over this subject without doing justice to the 



114 A RIDE TN FRANCB. 

Americans, amongst whom I lately resided. 
My father has remarked, somewhere in his 
writings, that, in proportion as men are really 
brave, they are tender of imposing laborious or 
degrading duties upon women. The Americans, 
I must say, are a very great evidence in sup- 
port of this assertion. When I was in Ame- 
rica I lived (in order to learn to speak French) 
a good while among French people. They 
were very polite, and, generally, good-tem- 
pered and obliging; but they used, I re- 
member, to ridicule the Americans very much 
on account of what they termed their 
grossierete' ; that is to say,- the want of polite- 
ness, the rudeness of manner, of the Americans, 
and, particularly, as connected with their at- 
tentions to the ladies. Now, though I have 
too great an opinion of Jonathan's courage 
to think that he would voluntarily yield any 
thing honourable that attaches to his name ; 
yet, if his politeness were a matter of question, 
Jonathan would, I am sure, rather give up 
all pretensions to that, than he would see his 
fair country-women spreading dung with their 
hands, and would rather bear all the burden 
of Monsieur's ridicule and sneer, than suffer 
their backs to bear that of a basket full of dung! 



PROVINCE OF TOURA1NE. 115 
TOURS" — PROVINCE OF TOURAINE. 

(Five leagues from Cormery.) 

Thursday Noon, 6 Nov. 

150. The country, from Chateauroux to 
Tours, particularly on the approach to this 
latter place, is more interesting than that on 
the other side of Chateauroux. There is a 
good deal of open land, without any fences ; 
but, fences are not, here, of much use, except- 
ing as boundary marks; for, there are no 
animals, of any kind, allowed to run loose, 
either upon a farm or upon the roads. There 
is no danger of trespass, even on the part of 
a flock of turkeys, for these birds, as well as 
all roving animals, about a farm, have con- 
stantly a person to mind them. 

151. At about a mile before you enter 
Tours, on the right hand side of the road, 
coming from Comery, there is a fine old place, 
called Gramont. Tours is an archbishoprick; 
and the house at Gramont, is a palace, which 
was built by a former archbishop, and was 
put into other hands at the time of the Revo- 
lution. The estate now belongs to some one 
who lives at Tours, but who has allowed his 
purchase to become much wanting in repair. 



116 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

152. Tours is the finest city, by far, that I 
have yet been in in France, excepting Paris, 
with which, of course, no other is to be com- 
pared. It is beautifully situated in a valley, 
with the Loire running along on one side of 
it, and the Cher on the other. The river Cher 
is a branch of the Loire ; it joins the Loire at 
some distance below Tours, and runs, from 
Tours, about thirty leagues to the south. On 
entering Tours I cross the Cher. There is a 
large space of rich meadow along side of the 
river; and here I saw a flock of sheep, the 
best stock of that kind that I have seen in 
this country. The common sheep, and the 
merinos, that I have seen in France, do not 
weigh more than from 10 to 13 pounds 
a quarter ; but the sheep which I see on this 
meadow would weigh, I should think, as much 
as 20 or 25 pounds. They are handsomely 
formed, as well as of a good size, and are not 
unlike our New Leicesters. They are rather 
short than long legged. Their fleeces are 
white, and pretty heavy. Their faces and 
legs of a dingy red colour, like those of the 
South Downs in England. Mr. Arthur 
Young, in speaking, a good many years ago, 
of the sheep of France, says, that, in general, 
these sheep are bad ; or, at any rate, that they 
are quite inferior sheep compared to our own; 



PROVINCE OF TOURAINE. 11/ 

and I think, from what I have seen, that the 
French have very little improved in this ar- 
ticle of stock. 

153. I have seen many herds of goats, 
grazing along with the cows, as I came from 
Chateauroux. The goats are, I am informed, 
used for their milk, of which there is a good 
deal of cheese made in this country. 

154. I cross Loire, again, at Tours, and 
then leave that river, for good, on my way to 
Rouen. The Loire runs close by the edge of 
the city, and is, at Tours, wider, I think, than 
the Thames is at London. 

155. As soon as I arrived at Tours, I went 
to look at the cathedral. It is not to be com- 
pared with the cathedrals of Bourges or 
Amiens. It is, however, the finest building 
that now remains in this city ; but the despoil- 
ing fingers of the Revolution have left their 
traces upon even this. 



Friday Night, 7 Nov. 



156. 1 have stayed at Tours this day, in 
order that I might go to see some vines, which 



118 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

belong to the landlord of the inn where I 
lodge. 

157. 1 dined, yesterday at the Table d'Hote. 
I got into conversation with my landlord, who 
was one of the company, and whom I had not 
seen before. After talking with this gentle- 
man some time, I made bold to ask him what 
he was, when I found that he was my host. 
He told me, amongst other things, that there 
were a great many English people at Tours ; 
or, at least, that there had been of late, many 
of them, even families who had settled there, 
having left the place on account of the Spanish 
war, from the result of which they entertained 
apprehensions of danger to themselves. He 
told me that there was an English nobleman, 
living in a fine house near Tours, who expended 
much money in the neighbourhood. I asked 
him if the lords in his country were as rich as 
those in my country. He said he did not ex- 
actly understand me, for, that there were no 
persons in France of the name of Lord. There 
were Nobles, he said, but no " Mi Lords." 
But, said I, if you have no noblemen that you 
call Mi Lord, you have noblemen that you 
call Mon Seigneur, which means the same 
thing. We could not understand one another, 
for some time. He could not conceive how it 



I 



PROVINCE OF TOURA1NE. 119 

was, that My Lord and Mon Seigneur were 
two titles that had but one common meaning : 
and I laughed when I heard him explain his 
idea of the difference between the two titles. 
The French people write the words My Lord, 
Mi Lord, which makes the orthography of the 
phrase somewhat more correspondent with 
that of their own language. Our word thou- 
sands, is written, in French, milles. And my 
host had always supposed, he said, that the 
word 31i, which preceded the name of Lord 3 
was, correctly speaking, only[an abbreviation of 
the word milles, which, in French, means thou- 
sands. So, that, if the title of an English 
noblemen were written at full, it would be, 
Milles-Lord, or, Lord of thousands: a Lord 
worth a great many francs a year. He said 
that, according to this notion of his, he could 
not suppose that " Mi Lord " meant the same 
as " Mon Seigneur ;" for, said he, our Nobles, 
whom we call " Mon Seigneur," are not, some- 
times, worth a sou. He was quite astonished 
when I told him that the title of Mi Lord } as 
he called it, was, as well as that of Mon Seig- 
neur, capable of existing along with the want 
of pecuniary means. The French call a man 
that is enormously rich, a millionaire, which 
is an extravagant term, meaning, a man of 
millions: and this (however erroneous it might 



120 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

be) was my landlord's idea of an English 
Lord. 



158. The neighbourhood of Tours is a great 
place for vines, and for the making of fine 
wine. I went along with my landlord to-day 
to see his vineyard, which is at about half a 
league from the city. The vintage of the 
black grapes is not quite finished; here, and 
that of the white grapes is not begun. In this 
part of France they let the white grapes hang 
as long as possible, before they gather them, 
because, they say, it makes the wine stronger 
and of better flavour. The snow is, they tell 
me, sometimes upon the ground before the 
grapes are gathered. I saw a great many 
acres of vineyard to day. The vines look 
beautiful at this time, with all their leaves off, 
and loads of ripe grapes hanging upon them. 
The vines, which are planted in cuttings, or 
slips (just as gooseberries and currants are) of 
the last year's wood, begin to bear when about 
four or five years old. An acre of vineyard, 
of the best sort of vines, in full bearing, is 
worth, at Tours, about 3000 francs ; or 125/. 
of our money. This year, they say, the vines 
will yield from 10 to 12 barrels of wine to the 
acre : barrels of 250 bottles each ; or, as was 
before observed, of about 80 English wine- 



PROVINCE OF TOURAINB. 121 

gallons each. Good wine may be bought at 
Tours, by the single bottle, for 10 sous, or 5d. 
English, the bottle. The barrel, or piece 9 of 
this year's wine, will bring from 50 to 60 
francs, at this place. But the wine of this 
year will not be of the best quality, on account 
of the grapes not having ripened quickly, which 
they should do to make very good wine. 
Some of the vines are very old : some of them 
forty, some fifty years old. The land round 
Tours is hilly; uncommonly good strong 
land, and stoney, which is just the character 
of land to suit the vine. There is muoh rock 
in the hills, here, as at Loches ; and the wine- 
makers have caves, hewed out of the rocks, 
under the brows of the hills, in which to de- 
posit the wine, and to carry on the process of 
making it. Some of the vines in this part of 
the country are cultivated in the espalier 
fashion. This is not, however, generally the 
case, where there is any considerable quantity 
of vineyard together. The common way is, 
to stick one stake, about four feet high, up to 
each vine. The stakes are pulled up, at this 
time of the year, when no longer wanted, and 
placed away in a stack, just as hop-poles are 
in England. The stakes are, as I said before, 
made of coppice-wood, hazel, ash, and other 
kinds. They do not last above a couple of 



122 A HIDE IN FRANCE. 

years ; for, if used longer, they become rotten, 
and are easily broken by the wind. I was, 
when at Chateauroux, informed, that, further 
to the South, the cultivators of the vine make 
use of stakes of Locust, which, they say, grow 
in coppices, and last a great number of years. 
The Locust is, in France, generally called Ro- 
binia ; but in the vineyards the stakes of it are 
called, bois de fer ; or, iron-wood ; a name 
which the Locust very well deserves. 

159. There is a kind of grape, which I saw 
on some vines here, made use of to give a co- 
lour to the red wine. When this grape is 
squeezed, the juice is of a fine dark colour., a 
mixture of purple and red. It is made use of 
in giving a colour to all red wine, which could 
not have the fine colour that we see in it, but 
tor the use of this sort of grape. The vintage 
of the white grapes begins, this year, at about 
this time, the 7th of November. 

160. As I went along towards the vineyard 
of my landlord, I saw the ruins of a. very an- 
cient convent of the order of St. Benedict. 
This convent used to be, in its time, a great 
place of assemblage for the monks belonging 
to the order of St. Benedict, who used to come 
there from all parts of the kingdom. The 



PROVINCE OF TOUttAINE. 123 

stable, for the accommodation of the horses 
of such visitors, contained upwards of a hun- 
dred stalls. The window places, my landlord 
informed me, were, in the dwelling part of the 
convent alone, five hundred and sixty. Very 
little, however, of this part of the building is 
now in existence. The remaining part of it, 
which is still enough to make a good dwell- 
ing-house, is occupied by the brother-in-law 
of my host, who rents it of a gentleman by 
whom all the confiscated estate has been pur- 
chased. I see that the walls, which used to 
enclose the gardens of this fine convent, re- 
main untouched ; they are built of very solid 
materials, and are not less than three feet in 
thickness. 

161. The church of St. Martin, which used, 
in former times, to be the richest church in 
Tours, is almost entirely destroyed. Nothing 
but the tower of it remains; and that is now 
used as a shot-tower, 

162. Tours is an important manufacturing 
place. Its manufactures are very various. 
The most considerable articles are, silks of 
different kinds, woollen cloths, leather, and 
porcelaine, or china. The china which is ma- 
nufactured in France, is of very fine quality, 

g2 



124 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

and of great beauty in its way. The journey- 
men employed in the cloth and silk manufac- 
tories, here, get from 1 to 3, and, some of 
them, 4 francs a-day. The wages of men 
servants, such as grooms, or footmen, may be 
stated at about 300 francs (or 12/. a-year) be- 
sides their board and lodging. A maid ser- 
vant, a housemaid, gets from 150 to 200 francs. 
A cook (a valuable servant among the French) 
about 300 or 350 francs. I speak of these as 
the servants of gentlemen, or persons of for- 
tune. 

163. The city of Tours, which is the ca- 
pital of this Province, is an extensive place. 
Its population amounts to 21,000 inhabitants. 



LA ROUE PROVINCE OF TOURAINE. 

(Five leagues from Tours.) 

Saturday Night, 8 Nov. 

164. Before I set off from Tours this morn- 
ing, I went, as I had been directed by the 
Commissioner of Police, to the Hotel de Ville, 
which is the place for transacting all the pub- 
lic business of the city. Here is the office of 
the Mayor. It was necessary for me to go to 



PROVINCE OP TOURA.INE. 125 

this office, in order to have my passport r or 
England signed. With regard to my pass- 
port, I have found no sort of difficulty in tra- 
velling. I got it, in the first place, from the 
French * Ambassador, in London, at whose 
office it was signed for Paris. On quitting 
Paris, I had it signed for Tours ; that is to say, 
the officer who signed it stated, upon the pass- 
port, that I was permitted to go as far as that 
place. As soon as any stranger arrives at an 
inn, in France, although it may be his inten- 
tion to lodge there but for one night, the 
people of the house are obliged to make a re- 
port of him to the police j whereupon, it is 
the duty of some officer (a gens d'arme) to 
come to the inn and examine your passport, 
to see whether you be travelling according to 
its terms. An innkeeper is also obliged, when 
you leave his house, to inform the police of 
your departure. But these regulations are 
not always strictly observed on the part of the 
innkeepers, for 1 have lodged at several places 
at which the people made no report of me at 
all. It is, however, very proper for a traveller 
to be careful how he act with regard to such 
matters ; for, if I, for instance, were to proceed 
on my road from Tours to Rouen, without 
there being any certificate of my having the 
permission of the government to proceed in 



126 A RIX»; IN FRANCE. 

that direction, I should, if a gens d'arme were 
to demand a look at my credentials, stand a 
chance of being escorted by him back again 
to Tours ! I might, to be sure, go alfl the way, 
without being subjected to so unpleasant an 
adventure ; but, the possibility of being so 
subjected is a sufficient inducement to a 
traveller to mind what he is about. 

165. I went, therefore, to get my passport 
signed in such a way as to allow me to go to 
England by the way of Calais. I had to wait, 
for some time, in the police office. While I sat 
there, a woman, amongst other persons, came 
into the office, and, upon being asked by one 
of the clerks what she wanted, approached 
towards him, holding out a little book. The 
clerk took hold of the book, and leaned back 
in his chair to read. It did not strike me 
what could be the meaning of this ; but I ob- 
served that the woman eyed him with great 
anxiety. The clerk looked through the book 
for some time without saying any thing ; but, 
by-and-by, all of a sudden, giving a start, and 
darting an indignant look at the woman, he 
exclaimed : " What, Madam ! Hope for per- 
mission to publish a book like this ! Polities in 
love-songs ! " " Tenez," said he, to the mor- 
tified applicant ; " Tenez : emportez votre 



PROVINCE OF TOURAINE. Y2"J 

jivre! Chantez, Madame, de V amour, autant 
que vous voudriez ; mais, de la politique 11 rite 
faut pas chanter ! " * The case appeared to 
be tliis : the woman sold song-books, and 
came, in compliance with that part of the laws 
of France which guards against the " licenti- 
ousness of the press," to have the song-book in 
question examined, previous to her beginning 
to publish it ; and, it was the discovery of 
some rhyme which made rather too free with 
a forbidden subject that caused this officer 
(conciliating as are the songs of love) to in- 
dulge in those vehemently loyal expressions^ 
which terrified the poor woman, and which 
gave me a much more correct idea than I had 
before of the state of tfw press in France, 

166. La Roue is but a village. Theite is 
another village, quite a small one, btit a pretty 
place, called Membreurl, between this ajid 
Tours. 

167. The market of Tours, which I went to 
look at this morning, is one of very general 
traffic. Cattle and horses, besides all sorts or 
vegetables, fruits, and coarse manufactures, 

* Eere, Madam, take away your book. Sing oflove, 
Madam, as much as you please; but, of politic-.; you 
must not sin? ! 



128 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

are brought there, every Saturday, for sale. 
A good stout cart-horse, at this market, is 
worth from 300 to 400 francs (from 12Z. to 
16/. our money) and upwards ; a cow, from 
60 to 100 francs (from 2L 10s. to 41) The 
corn market is held in an old gothic chapel. 
The price of wheat, at Tours, is from 13 to 15 
francs the sack of 148 French pounds weight. 
Rather cheaper than at Briarre. At Chateau- 
roux wheat was \vorth, at the time 1 passed, 
about 12 francs the sack. Bread at Tours, the 
very best bread, sells for three sous the pound : 
that is rather less than 6d. for the weight of 
our quartern loaf. When I speak, in paragraph 
48, of a loaf of bread, the size of our quar- 
tern loaf, selling for 5 sous, I must be under- 
stood to be making a comparison with regard 
to bulk only ; for, the loaf for 5 sous was not, 
most likely, more than about 2 lbs. in weight. 
All kinds of meat are nearly of one price : 
beef, mutton, veal, lamb, and pork, are all sold 
here at 8 sous (or 4d. our money) the lb. 1 
ate some bread at Tours, which was, I think, 
the best bread I ever tasted. The bread that 
the country people eat is made, in great part, 
of rye ; and that sells, of course, for less than 
the finest of the wheat bread. It sells for 
about one sou and a half, or two sous ; but, it 
is more wholesome food than the whitest oi 



PROVINCE OF MAINE. 129 

our baker's bread in England. Two sous a 
pound is about4(/. for the weight of a quartern 
loaf. There are no drugs put into the bread in 
France, neither in the towns nor in the coun- 
try places, as far as I can find out. My land- 
lord at Tours had been, he told me, a baker; 
but, I could not make him understand what 
alum was, and he did not seem to perceive at 
all how the making of bread bad should be a 
source of profit to a baker. 



LE MANS PROVINCE OF MAINE. 

(Fifteen leagues from La Roue, through Chateau 
du Loir and Ecommoy.) 

Sunday Night, 9 Nov. 

168. Chateau du Loir is a little town, situ- 
ated at the confluence of the two little rivers 
Loir and Ive. The population of this place is 
between 2 and 3000. There are some manu- 
factories in the town, of cotton stuffs. Ecommoy 
is a small village, at about half w T ay between 
Chateau du Loir and Le Mans. 

169. The road to Le Mans, from Tours, is 
over the most beautiful, the richest, and the 
best cultivated country that I have, for any 
extent together, yet seen in France. The 

g 5 



130 



A RIDE IN FRANCE, 



land is more divided by hedges and ditches. 
Quick-set and black-thorn hedges are as com- 
mon, in many places, as they are in England. 
The views are very fine, in different places, 
along the road ; nevertheless, I do not see any 
thing to equal the beauty of Fromenteau and 
Essonne. About Ecommoy, and from that 
place towards Le Mans, there is a great deal 
of forest of pine timber. Some of the pines 
have been planted by hand. In general, they 
appear to have sprung up from seed scattered 
by the wind. The soil of the forest is the 
lightest and most sandy that I have met with ; 
and I see some heath growing here, in the 
bare places, which 1 have not seen any where 
else in France. 

170» Between Ecommoy and Le Mans I 
perceived, from the stalks that were remaining 
in some of the fields, that Indian corn is a pro- 
duct of this part of France. This corns grows 
well, they tell me, here. It yields about 1G0 
bushels on ground nearly equal to an English 
acre, that is to say, bushels which, of wheat, 
weigh from 18 to 20 lbs., and it sells for about 
the same price as wheat. The people here use 
It only in the fatting of pigs, for which purpose 
it is considered here, as it is in America, to be 
the best of all food. It is planted on ridges 



PROVINCE Otf MAINE. 13] 

which are about five feet apart ; fovo rows of 
the corn upon every ridge. The plants are 
from a foot to eighteen inches apart in the 
row, and the rows are about the same distance 
iyom each other. Supposing the Indian corn 
to weigh 58 lbs. a bushel, the above crop is 
about 31 English bushels ; and this is, indeed, 
a very good crop ; it is four English quarters 
to the acre, and that is much beyond the 
average of our crops of wheat. 

171. I met a" man, to-day, upon the road, 
who told me that he was a manufacturer of 
linen cloth. He said that he earned, by the 
loom which he worked in his own house, 
about one franc a day. The labouring people, 
he told me, dress and spin the hemp and flax, 
which they raise in their own gardens, or little 
farms, and carry them, in the shape of yarn, to 
the markets, where country manufacturers, 
such as my informant himself was, buy the 
yarn, and sell it again to the labourers in the 
shape of linen. The stuff for making a la- 
bourer's shirt, strong, well bleached j and made 
in this way, costs about two francs ; that is to 
say, 20 pence English. 



I) 



132 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

Monday, 10 Nov, 

172. The city of Le Mans, which contains 
18,500 inhabitants, is the capital of the Pro- 
vince of Maine, and is situated on the river 
called the Sarthe, which is a branch of the 
Loire. This city is about the same size as that 
of Tours, and is just such an agreeable place. 
The environs of it are, like those of Tours, 
very pleasant. There are a great many gar- 
dens, and vineyards, kept in the best order. 

173. The finest building in Le Mans is the 
cathedral ; it is a very large and ancient build- 
ing, but not one of any uncommon beauty. 
The manufactures of Le Mans are, linens, coarse 
cottons, bomhasins, cotton handkerchiefs, lace, 
soap, and wax for candles, 

174. There is, at this time, a fair going on 
in Le Mans. It continues for eight days ; and 
this day is the last of its duration. This fair, 
which takes place four times in the year, is 
very much the same as our fairs in England 
are. Horses, cows, pigs, and other farming 
stock, are sold at the beginning of the fair ; 
and, after the sale of these, comes that of all 
the varietiefe of manufacture, and of things of 



PROVINCE OP MAINE. 



133 



taste, such as belong to one of our great fairs 
in England. 

175. I got a sample of Indian corn, of a 
seedsman, to-day. This sample was very good 
corn. There was no difference between it 
and the Indian corn I have seen in America. 
The corn was not of the largest size ; but it 
was perfect, in all respects, and well ripened. 
Mr. Arthur Young says, that Indian corn 
will not grow, in France, forasmuch as nearly 
fifty leagues south of Le Mans, 

176. All the way from Chateauroux to this 
place I have had fine weather. Though rather 
cold in the mornings and evenings, it has been 
warm enough, sometimes, in the day time, to 
make the flies very troublesome about my 
horse. To-day is a clear cold day, which puts 
one in mind of winter. 

177. Yesterday, when I arrived at this place, 
the landlady of the inn asked me, upon my 
telling her that I wanted dinner, if I would 
have some potatoes, I could not conceive why 
she should ask me such a question, knowing, 
as I did, that potatoes are no great favourites 
111 this country. I had, however, a great 
curiosity to see how the potatoes would be 



134 A RIDE !N FRANCE. 

cooked, and what quantity of them wouk. 
given to me ; and I answered her question, 
therefore, and with some eagerness, in the 
affirmative. She caused to be boiled, on my 
account, more than half a gallon of potatoes, 
which was a greater quantity than 1 had ever 
g een at one time, on a French table, before, 
and she seemed to think, when she placed this 
dish before me, that I had obtained the food of 
all others that I liked to eat. She laughed at 
me, and exclaimed, " Oh ! que les Anglois sont 
fort pour les poynmes de terre ! " This saying is 
scarcely translateable into English ; but it 
means, as near as can be, Oh ! how fond 
Englishmen are of potatoes ! I am sure 
she did not mean to insidt me, though she 
must have pitied my taste. She was soon 
convinced, that there are Englishmen who 
have little relish for this insipid root. The 
price of potatoes here is one franc and a half 
for a measure, which is rather larger than half 
an English bushel. An English bushel of 
them would be worth about 2 francs and a 
half, or, 2s. Id. which is about twice the price 
of potatoes in England, 



PROVINCE OF MAINE. LV. 



BEAUMONT PROVINCE OF MAIN It. 

{Seven leagues from Le Mans, through La Bazochc. | 
Tuesday Night, U Nov. 

178. Beaumont is a little town, containing 
two or three thousand inhabitants, on the left 
bank of the river Sarthe. There is a good deal 
of wine made here 5 but, the people tell me, 
that the vines have, within a few years past, 
failed to produce as much wine as they for- 
merly did; in consequence of which, there 
are not so many vines cultivated at this place 
now, as there used to be. — The neighbour- 
hood of Beaumont is somewhat famous for its 
breeding of, and dealings in cattle ; and, in 
the town, there are some manufactories of 
cotton, and of some other articles. 

179. I find some lucerne hay for- my horse 
in most parts of the country. The French 
think the hay of lucerne the best of any ; and 
my horse seems, from the manner in which he 
deals with this sort of fodder, to be exactly of 
the same opinion. There is but little differ- 
ence between the price of the hay of lucerne 
and that of common hay. Hay, at Beaumont, 
sells for 25 francs the thousand pounds weight; 
and straw, which is dear at this time, brings 



136 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

nearly as much as the hay. The hay is at very 
low price, compared with the hay in any part 
of England. The 1000 lbs. French weight 
make 1 125 lbs. English weight, and this is 5 lbs. 
more than half an English ton. So that here 
is half a ton of hay, and of fine hay too, for 
20^. and lOd. or, at the rate of 41 s. and 8d. an 
English ton of twenty hundred weight, 112 lbs. 
to the hundred. 



ALANCON— PROVINCE OP NORMANDY. 
(Five leagues from Beaumont, through La Hutte.) 
Wednesday Night, 12 Nov. 

180. The city of Alancon, the population of 
which amounts to 13,500, is a place of con- 
siderable importance. It stands upon the 
river Sarthe, and is in the province of Nor- 
mandy, though close upon the borders of that 
of Maine. There are several good churches 
in this city, the most important of which is the 
cathedral. The cathedral, though but a small 
one, is ancient, like all the churches, indeed, 
that I have seen in France. The oldest build- 
ings in England are always the most beautiful ; 
and, so I find it with the buildings in this 
country. I have not seen such a thing as a 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 13/ 

new church in France, any where ; nor any 
church that has not apparently heen built for 
several centuries. 



Thursday, 13 Nov. 

181. The manufactures of Alancon are 
pretty large. The lace which is made here is 
celebrated for its superior fineness. Near this 
place there are some iron-mines, quarries of 
red lead, and quarries containing a fine sort of 
stone, fit for the making of mill-stones. 

182. Thursday is the market-day at Alan- 
con. The corn-market here is held in a spa- 
cious piazza, which is appropriated to the 
purpose. The measures for corn in France are' 
very various, in respect to dimensions, in dif- 
ferent parts of the kingdom. I have met with 
something called a boissean (bushel) in all 
parts of the country ; but, then, the bushel is 
not every where of the same dimensions. The 
standard of corn measure, legally established, 
is, as far as I can find, what they call the hec- 
tolitre. The hectolitre I saw in the market of 
Alancon, where this measure of wheat, 
weighing, upon an average, from 36 to 38 
pounds, sold for 4 francs ; which is just the 
price at which I found wheat at Briarre. 



138 



A RIDK IN "FRANCE. 






where, as the reader will remember, 148 
pounds sold for 16 francs. At Alan^on the 
hectolitre is considered as the bushel, while, 
at Briarre, it is the Decametre, that is, just one 
half the hectolitre. At Briarre it requires eight 
bushels to make a sack : at Alancon, where the 
bushel. is twice the weight of the bushel of 
Briarre, it requires only four bushels to make a 
sack. Further in the interior of Normandy, 
there is a bushel of from 72 to 76 pounds 
weight of wheat; that is, of double the size of 
the hectolitre, and four times the size of the 
bushel at Briarre ; nevertheless, in those 
places where this large bushel is found, the 
sack of wheat is not of less than four bushels. It 
does not seem altogether unaccountable why 
the sack of wheat in Normandy should be, 
comparatively, so very heavy; for, the men of 
this province are considered, in France, to be 
nearly tw T ice as strong as those of any of the 
middle or southern provinces. 1 have, my- 
self, observed a great difference btween the 
people about Briarre and Chateauroux, and 
the people I have seen since I crossed the 
borders of the province of Normandy. 

183. The French perch, in the measuring 
of land, consists of 22 square feet; and a 
French foot measure is exactly eleven-twelfths 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 139 

of an English inch more than an Eng- 
lish foot measure ; that is to say, thirteen 
English inches, all but the eleventh of an English 
inch. In this part of France there is the Ar- 
pent, of 100 perches, the Acre de Normandie, 
of 160 perches, the Acre Ordinaire, of 120 
perches, and the Journal, of 80 perches. The 
Arpent is, I believe, the most common measure 
throughout all France; but, in this Province, 
the land is generally purchased or rented by 
the Acre de Normandie. 

184. The best land, hereabouts, is worth 
from 800 to 1200 francs the Acre de Norman- 
die. That is to say, the best arable land ; for, 
meadow land is worth more than land under 
the plough. Good meadow land is worth as 
much as from 1600 to 2400 francs. The arable 
land is reckoned to yield from 40 to 80 hecto- 
litres of wheat to the Acre de Normandie, and 
the meadows to yield from 5000 to 8000 pounds 
of hay. 

185. Let us see, then, how these prices 
stand in comparison with English prices of 
the same things. But, first, we must reduce 
the French measure to English measure. The 
price of land, for the Acre de Normandie is, 
arable, 1000 francs, on an average ; meadow. 



140 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

2000 francs on an average; that is to say, 
arable, 411. 13s. 4d.; meadow, 83/. 6s. Sd. 
These would be very high English prices, if 
it were the English acre that I am speaking 
of. But, though there are 160 rods, or perches, 
in our Statute acre as well as in the Acre de 
Normandie, the latter contains nearly twice as 
much land as the former. For, in the first 
place, our rod is of only 16k feet, while that 
of Normandy is of 22 feet. Our rod contains 
272 square feet ; the Norman rod 484 square 
feet. Then the Norman foot contains 166 of 
our square inches, while our foot contains 144 
of those same inches. So that (leaving aside 
unimportant fractions), one Norman rod con- 
tains 525 English square feet; and two English 
rods contain but 5 44 English square feet. One 
Norman acre contains 308 (and nearly 309) 
English square rods, or perches; and two 
English acres contain but 320 English square 
rods, or perches. Thus, then, the arable land 
in Normandy is worth (casting aside fractions) 
201. the English acre ; and the meadow land 
40/. the English acre. This is now, I believe, 
the price of very good land in England ; and, 
I am here speaking of very good land in France ; 
land that bears from 30 to 40 hectolitres of 
wheat, or about 26 English bushels to the 
acre on an average / and of meadow land 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 141 

that yields more than an English ton and ahalf 
of hay ; that is to say, 30 hundred weight, at 
112 lbs. to the hundred. 

186. Timber is sold here by a measure which 
is called the marque. The timber is measured 
either while it is standing, or after it is cut 
into logs. The marque is a measure of 3 feet 
long, 10 inches over, and 10 inches deep. The 
best oak timber is worth about 2 francs and 
10 sous the marque. The best cor de-wood is 
worth from 24 to 30 francs the corde ; and 
the corde, here, is a measure of 8 feet long and 
4 feet high, the wood being 3 feet and a half 
in length. Inferior corde-wood, such as is tit 
for the making of charcoal, sells at from 5 to 
7 francs the corde. This corde is not much 
greater in dimensions than our corde. The 
wood is full as dear as wood is in England. 

187- House-rent is not high in France. At 
Alancon you may rent a comfortable house, 
consisting of six or seven good rooms, for 300 
francs a year ; that is to say, for 12Z. ster- 
ling, or thereabouts ; and, let it be remarked, 
that this is in a very fine and fashionable place. 

188. At this place I have ascertained some 
particulars relating to the education, or school- 



142 A RfDE IX FRANCE. 

ing, of young people. I am informed that, 
for the schooling of a young man in the Col- 
lege which belongs to this city, it does not 
cost, boarding and lodging included, more 
than 500 francs, or 20/. 16s. 8d. a year. From 
400 to 900 francs (16/. to 36/.) is quite as 
much as the schooling of a young person, 
either male or female, will cost in the best 
boarding-schools and colleges in France. The 
colleges are all under the direction of the go- 
vernment ; and there are a great many more 
of these institutions in France than there are 
in England. Every town of importance ap- 
pears to have a college belonging to it. At 
these colleges, and at the boarding-schools 
which ram supposing, the scholars are taught 
the w-hole of what is called the classics, com- 
prehending the sciences of logic and rhetoric. 
In country places, farmers and country people 
send their children to day-scliools ; just as it 
is common to do in England, while the chil- 
dren are quite young. At these country day- 
schools, for 100 or 200 francs a year (41 to SI.), 
the students obtain, generally, a smattering of 
the learned languages ; of Latin, at all events ; 
as well as those who go to schools of a more 
costly degree. The teaching of Latin to farm- 
ers' and tradesmen's sons is very common in 
France. 



PttOVINCE OF NORMANDY. 143 

189. I hare, in different places, made in- 
quiries about the price of pension, as the 
French call it, or boarding and lodging, which 
seems to be pretty nearly the same in all parts 
of the country. At St. Omer's I could board 
and lodge (washing included) in the inn at 
which 1 was, for 12 francs and a half a week : 
I mean without my horse. At Cosne it would 
cost, at an inn, from 13 to 14 francs. At Le 
Mans, 15 francs. At Tours, the same as at 
Le Mans. At this place, Alancon, from 10 to 
15 francs. A young man may board and 
lodge in a respectable private family for about 
the same money, unless he require uncom- 
monly good fare, or a great deal of waiting 
upon, in which case it might cost him, per- 
haps, 20 francs a week. All this is very cheap, 
compared with England and the United States. 
The lowest (10 francs) is 8s. 4d., and the 
highest (20 francs) 16s. Sd. For fare and en- 
tertainment as good as the French, you must 
pay, 1 suppose, nearly three times the sum in 
England ; and in New York (in which prices 
are not higher than in other good towns of 
the Union), the price of board and lodging is 
from 5 to 10 dollars a week, that is, from 
11. 2s. 6d. to 21. 5s. The five dollar enter- 
tainment is by no means of a luxurious kind. 
Pltenty of meat always in America, and, in- 



144 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

deed, plenty of every thing to eat. But, no 
private sitting-room. Bed-rooms, most fre- 
quently, with more than one bed in each. A 
common table for meals. Very little selection 
as to the state of life of the boarders. So 
that, if you compare the entertainment as 
well as the prices, France is nearly two-thirds 
cheaper than America. 

190. The words modesty and delicacy, as 
applied to matters relating to the fair sex, 
have, as all travellers in this country must per- 
ceive, a very different signification in French 
from what they have in our language. To- 
day, as I stood looking out of the window of 
the dining-room at the inn, in front of which 
is a large open square, surrounded on every 
side by houses, 1 saw a public conveyance, a 
sort of diligence, drive up, with three women 
in it, who had come from Falaise, and who ap- 
peared, all of them, from their dress, to be 
respectable farmers' wives. The carriage was 
drawn up in a most conspicuous place ; and 
the driver, after having assisted the passen- 
gers to alight, began to unbuckle the har- 
ness of his horses. It was in this situation, 
one so completely public as the open square, 
and not five yards from the driver of the coach 
which they had just stepped out of, that I, who 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 145 

remained at the dining-room window, could 
not help observing, with regard to these ladies, 
something which, while it was unattended by 
any thing like retirement on their part, was so 
indelicate, in our sense of the word, that, if it 
were not for the sake of contrasting the man- 
ners of the two people, the French and the 
English, I could hardly, with strict propriety, 
make even an allusion to it. 






NONANT — PROVINCE OP NORMANDY. 

(Eight leagues from Alancon, through Seez.) 

Friday Night, 14 Nov; 

191. The country, all the w r ay from Le 
Mans to this place, like that between Le Mans 
and Tours, is uncommonly beautiful and rich. 
The fields are very small, and closely enclosed 
by live hedges, and ditches, exactly as our fields 
are in England. 

192. There is little now doing onthefarms,ex- 
cept theputting in of winter crops. The grain is 
here sowed on land ploughed, as I before de- 
scribed, into ridges. The casting of the seed grain 
upon the ground is not, however, always done in 

H 



146 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

one fashion. About this neighbourhood the 
seed is cast into the furrow, which is left open 
by the plough as it passes through the ground 
to form the ridges ; so that the wheat, or other 
grain sowed, comes up in drills ; and, as the 
ridges are, most frequently, four bout ridges, 
there are four drills upon each ridge. There 
appears to be very little care taken as to the 
straightness of the ploughing : it is curious, 
that in this Province, where the land is the 
finest and most highly cultivated, and where 
the fields are very small, the ridges of newly 
sowed grain are very crooked and slovenly 
looking. The sowing, wherever I see it going 
on, is performed by women, who follow the 
plough, and strew the grain along in the fur- 
row as fast as the plough turns out the earth. 
In order to insure the well covering over of 
the seed, a man or woman comes after the 
plough, and makes the surface of the ridge 
smooth with an instrument, which is simply a 
piece of slight wood, about eighteen inches 
long, through the middle of which is stuck 
one end of the handle held by the person who 
does the work. 

193. At Se£z there is a cathedral, close at 
the back of which is the palace of the Bishop 
of Alancon, whose place of residence is at 
u 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 147 

See*z. A part of the Bishop's dwelling is con- 
verted into a college for the education of per- 
sons who are to become jrriests, the whole bur- 
den of which class of the community is, in 
this country, supported out of the public taxes, 
and at no great expense. The priests, here, 
appear to be a very gentle and amiable sort of 
men, I always pull off my hat to any of them 
that I meet, and they always return the salu- 
tation with great politeness and even humility. 
They dress, not only while at church, but at 
all times, in a long sort of coat-gown, called 
a soutane, made of black cloth, and wear the 
old fashioned cocked-hat. You cannot mistake 
the country priest in France for any thing 
other than he is. His devout manner, and the 
simple and sacred habiliment that he always 
appears in, make you acquainted with his pro- 
fession at once. This is not the case with the 
divines of our country. In the famishing 
curate we do, to be sure, very often see an 
example of piety and mildness ; but the reli- 
gious character of the beneficed clergyman is 
not, at all times, to be recognized in his man- 
ners or in his personal appearance : he, though 
quite as sincere, no doubt, as these meeker 
priests In France, is very often admired as the 
most venturesome rider in the fervour of a fox- 
ckase ; as being a " good shot ;" as the best 
h2 



148 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

hand at a " rubber of whist ;" or, the most 
good-humoured companion, and maker of the 
hest joke, over a bottle of wine ! I cannot 
behold the sober and serious deportment of 
these priests without thinking of a pamphlet, 
published in London last Spring, and written 
by an Irish 'Squire, giving an account of an 
Irish Protestant Parson's sending a pair of 
garters to a female of his flock, with a motto 
which very few men except Irish 'Squires 
would venture to put into print. 

194. The town of Seez has 5600 inhabit- 
ants -, and here are some manufactures, of 
lace, muslins, of various sorts, and woollen 
stockings, 

195. Nonant is only a village, but it is as 
nice a little place as any I have seen in France. 
After I arrived here, I had time enough, in 
the course of the afternoon, to go about two 
leagues across the country, to see an establish- 
ment which is called Harasdupin. It is a 
place for the keeping of a stud of horses which 
belong to the King. I had a great curiosity 
to see some of the finest horses of France, 
which are to be seen at Harasdupin. The 
establishment is a very fine one, both as re- 
gards the buildings and fte care that is taken 



PROVINCE OF NORMAN OY 149 

of the horses belonging to it. The house 
which has been built here as a residence for 
the overseer of the stables, is quite a palace. 
The land which surrounds it, for some extent, 
belongs to the King, and consists in fine mea- 
dows to turn the cattle out into, besides a large 
forest, called the Forest of Alancon. Over all 
this land there is a view, from the house and 
stables, which makes the situation uncom- 
monly beautiful. Some of the horses that I saw 
here were fine animals. The stud of carriage- 
horses, brought from the neighbourhood of 
Caen were very handsome; but, I do not 
think France can show much in horses of a 
higher breed. In Normandy, and particularly 
in the neighbourhood of Caen, the finest car- 
riage-horses are to be found. The Province 
of Limosin is famed for possessing the horses 
of more blood. I saw some horses here which 
came from that Province. They were very 
light, and very pretty in their shape ; but, 
they did not display much of what we should 
call a thorough bred horse. There were two 
or three fine horses in these stables, brought 
from Arabia; and some blood-horses, which, 
the people told me, were purchased at a high 
price in England. The presence of the true 
English racers was very humiliating to the 
horses of Normandy and Limosin ; for, after 



15U A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

having seen the former, the latter were, I must 
say, scarcely worth looking at. 



ST. GAUBURGE — PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 

(Four leagues from Nonant, through Melro.) 

Saturday Noon, 15 Nov. 
196. I have had fine weather ever since I 
left Le Mans, till to-day ; the nights frosty, 
and the days clear and pleasant. To-day has 
heen foggy and chilly ; a kind of weather too 
Unpleasant for travelling over so pleasant a 
country as this. — St. Gauburge and Melro are 
both villages, but Melro a good deal the 
largest of the two. 



CONCHES- — PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 

(Tivclve leagues from St. Gauburge, through Oble, 
L'Aigle, Chande, ThaU % Boure, and Breteuil.) 

Sunday Night, 1G Nov. 
197. Oble is a small village, on the road 
to L'Aigle. L'Aigle is a manufacturing town 
on the river Rilie. Its manufactures are, lace, 
ribbons, cotton-stuffs, paper, pins, ironmongery, 
leather for book-binding, and ivire. There is a 
manufactory of needles here, which belongs to 



PROVINCE OP NORMANDY. 151 

an Englishman. The houses in this place, 
unlike those of any town I have before seen 
in France, are almost all built of brick. Po- 
pulation of I/Aigle, 5600. 

198. The road which I intended to take, 
from L'Aigle to Conches, goes through a 
small place called Lire ; and, upon this road, 
you are led, all the way, through a forest, 
which they call the Forest of Conches. It is a 
forest of oaks, which extends for six or seven 
leagues square, and is the property of an Aus- 
trian Prince, who comes to Conches some- 
times, to go a hunting in the Forest, where 
there is a good deal of game, and great num- 
bers of foxes, wolves, wild-boars, and deer. 
On leaving L'Aigle, I took a wrong road, and 
found myself at a little place called Chande, 
which is on the road to Paris. From Chande 
I passed, across the country and over a bad 
road, through the hamlets of Boure and Thael, 
to Breteuil, a town of about 4000 inhabitants. 
From Breteuil to Conches I had a better road 
to go upon ; but it did not, however, turn 
out so good in the end; for my horse cut 
his foot so badly, upon a flint stone, that he 
could hardly hobble on as far as this place. 
From Nonant to L'Aigle it is just the same 
delightful country as that from Le Mans to 



152 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

Nonant. Between this and L'Aigle the 
country is different. Some woodland ; but, 
mostly,, open plains of good arable land, in 
great part covered by apple and pear-trees, 
the fruits of which are used in making cider 
and perry. The best cider in France, is, I 
believe, made in this Province. But, no cider 
that I have tasted here lias been good. The 
cider is sour, and is made of such apples, that 
it can seldom be otherwise than bad. They 
gave me some cider at Le Mans which was 
tolerable, but that was considered to be the 
very best, and sold for eight sous a bottle, 
which is as much as the price of good wine 
in some parts of France. 



Monday, 17 Nov. 

199. I staid at Conches to-day, my horse 
being so lame that I was afraid to take him 

Upon the road. 

200. All round this place there is a great 
deal of iron-mine. There are forges of iron 
and blast-furnaces, at Conches, as well as at 
Breteuil, and many other places within a few 
leagues of this. The iron ore used at Conches 
is brought out of the forest ; and the iron is, 
they tell me, very good. The price of the 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 153 

best wrought-iron is about 30 francs (or 1 1. 5s.) 
for a hundred pounds weight. A blacksmith told 
me that a great deal of English iron had, of late, 
been sold here; but it was not, he said, so 
good as the iron of this country, and had 
found purchasers merely on account of its 
being rather cheaper than the French iron. 
— The workmen employed in the iron-works 
get. according to their worth, from 2 to 4 
francs a-day. Some of the men work hy the 
piece, others by the day. It is not, in this iron 
business, the custom to regard the Sunday as 
a day of entire rest. There are always some 
men to keep the furnaces a going, all day- 
long of a Sunday. People that keep shops, 
in France, whether it be in large towns, 
or in villages, do not shut up their shops 
during the whole of Sunday. They gene- 
rally keep them open till about twelve 
o'clock in the day, that is, till about the 
time at which high mass begins, and then 
shut them up till after church service, when 
they are again opened. There are some 
trades-people, indeed, who do not sell at 
all of a Sunday; but, then, these are such 
as can better afford to have a clear holiday in 
every week than the generality of trades- 
people can. They do not abstain from open- 
ing their shops from any religious scruples, 
h5 



154 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

nor on account of any law or regulation that 
would forbid them to sell of a Sunday ; if a 
French shopkeeper does not open his shop on 
a Sunday, it is either from disinclination to 
work, or a persuasion that his affairs are such 
as to admit of a holiday. Sunday is a very 
merry day in France. One great complaint 
that the French make against the English is, 
that our Sundays are so dull. In France, 
Sunday is the great day for going to theatres, 
for dancing and singing, and playing at bil- 
liards, dominos, cards, and other kinds of fri- 
volous games, to which the French (French 
men, at least,) are very much addicted. 

201. The French are universally spoken of 
as a lively, gay people. In this respect, I 
cannot help observing a great difference be- 
tween the men and the women of France. 
Frenchmen are certainly more gay than En- 
glishmen, but, I have been surprised tosee 
the countenances of the women, in this country, 
so serious, so full of anxiety and care. The 
truth, however, is, as I have pretty well exem- 
plified in paragraph 149, that " Madame" has 
more work to do than Monsieur's reputation 
for gallantry would induce one to suppose. 
In all sorts of shop-keeping, in France, it is 
the women who attend to the business, and 






PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 155 

the men have, comparatively, not much to do 
with it. The keeping of accounts, even, in 
many a tradesman's counting-house, is the 
task of the tradesman's wife or of his daughter. 
The selling of goods in the shops is principally 
done by the women ; the labour, in short, of 
the whole concern is performed by * Ma- 
dame;" and, it is natural enough to ask what 
Monsieur himself is about ? a question which 
may be too often determined by looking into 
the cafe (coffee-house), where the trifling 
amusements of billiards, cards, and dominos, 
are everlastingly kept alive. 

202. I see more good sheep in this province, 
than 1 have seen elsewhere through France. 
Sheep, in this country, are uncommonly do- 
cile. They are accustomed to be treated 
with so much gentleness by those who look 
after them, that the dogs even jump about 
and play with them without their being at all 
worried. 

203. Conches is a little town, on the left 
bank of the river Iton. Population, 2000. 
At Nonancourt, a place near this, there are 
several Englishmen, who have been settled 
there for some years, and who have manufac- 
tories, in iron, cotton, and other articles. — 



156 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

The farm labourer here gets, at this time of 
the year, about a franc and a half a-day (if he 
be boarded and lodged) besides his boarding 
and lodging. 



LOUVIERS — PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 

(Nine leagues from Conches, through La Bonne- 
ville and Evreux.) 

Tuesday Night, 18 Nov. 

204. The blacksmith at Conches made a 
sort of shoe, this morning, for my horse; it is 
a very ingenious contrivance, and has enabled 
my horse, though yet lame, to get on without 
hurting his ailing foot, which was cut at the 
bottom, or in the frog. 

205. The road to Evreux from Conches, is 
through a country not so rich, apparently, as 
what I have come through further back in 
Normandy. This road must, however, be a 
very interesting one to travel up in summer, 
for the views from it are beautiful and of great 
variety ; but, I am rather too late in the sea^ 
son to see this fine country in its perfection. 

206. The city of Evreux with a population 
of 9300 inhabitants, is situated on the banks 



PROVINCE OP NORMANDY. 157 

of the Iton ; and that river runs, alongside of 
the road, all the way from Conchee to Evreux, 
through fme water meadows, which lie in a 
valley below high hills, or mountains, of lime- 
stone, chalk, and flint. Evreux is a bishopric. 
Its manufactures, are, icoollen cloths, siamoise 
cloth, cotton velvet, cotton clotlis, and leather ; 
and a good deal of bleaching is carried on in 
this place. 

207. The woods, of oak and birch timber, 
are very extensive along the lops and sides of 
the hills, which continue from Evreux to 
Louviers. The arable land, from Evreux to 
Louviers, is an open plain, with a vast quan- 
tity of apple and pear trees, here and there, 
planted upon it. 

208. Louviers is, in size, about the same as 
Evreux. It is one of the greatest manufactur- 
ing towns in France; particularly in the 
article of woollen cloth, which is manufactured 
here in great quantity. The other articles of 
manufacture are various : muslins, cotton and 
woollen yarn, siamoise cloth, and nankins ; be- 
sides the dying and bleaching of cloth. The 
woollen cloth made here is said to be of the 
very finest and softest quality. A great part 
of the wool that is used in its manufacture, 



158 A RIDE IN FRANCE." 

comes, I understand, from Segovia, in Spain. 
A coat of superfine cloth, the best of such as 
are worn by gentlemen in England, costs, in 
Normandy, about 70 or 80 francs, or, from 21. 
18s. Ad. to 37. 6s. 8d. Wearing apparel, in 
general, is cheap. A good strong jacket, for 
the use of a farmer, or a workman upon a farm, 
made of woollen cloth, does not cost above 9 
or 10 francs, or Js, or 8s. Hats, shoes, and 
boots^ are very cheap in France. A pair of 
strong shoes for 6 francs, or 5s. j boots, such 
as cost 30s. in England, may be bought here 
for 18 francs, or, 15s. a pair ; and a hat, worth 
25s. with us, they get here for as little as 15 
francs, or 12s. 6d. 

209. On my road from La Bonneville, which 
is a little village, towards Evreux, a saw a wo- 
man washing clothes in a little rill, or brook 
of water, that ran through a meadow. This 
is the manner in which most of the washing is 
done in France. At Andres and St. Omers I 
saw them washing in tubs, just as the women 
wash in England ; but I have very seldom seen 
washing in doors practised, except at those two 
places. In passing through a town or village, 
in the vicinity of which there has been any 
stream of water, I have almost always seen 
some women, kneeling at the waters edge, 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 159 

washing clothes. They make use of soap, but 
do not rub the clothes between the knuckles, as 
the women do with us : they put the wet 
clothes upon a solid piece of wood, or upon a 
large stone, and slap them hard with a little 
piece of board, about 8 inches square, which 
has a handle to it, and is made for the express 
purpose. 

210. Some people that have been travellers 
in this country, exclaim, " how many beggars 
there are in France!" There are, to be sure, 
a good many beggars here ; but, I have not 
seen more of them in the country parts of 
France, than I should have seen in England, 
had I been travelling in England along the 
same distance of high road. I certainly did 
not see so many beggars in Paris as I have 
seen in London; and, there is this important 
difference between the individual appearance 
of the beggars in France, and that of English 
beggars : a very large portion of our beggars 
are persons neither aged nor infirm, while, in 
France, there is scarcely any object of this de- 
scription that is not old, or, in some way, in- 
capable of earning a living. The greater part 
of the beggars in England beg, because they 
cannot get employment; and the beggars in 
France beg because they are not fit to be em- 



160 A RIDK IN FRANCE. 

ployed. It is the state of society in England 
which causes the beggar, while, in France, it 
is his inability to render society any service 
which causes him to beg. I do not mean to 
say, that there are no objects of charity in 
France except those who are bodily infirm ; 
for, there must, in all countries, be some per- 
sons, who, although capable of exertion, have, 
owing to peculiar circumstances, no means of 
existence at their command. There are, of 
course, some persons of this description in 
France ; but, the sturdy beggar is not common 
in this country. The provision which, hy law, 
is made for the poor in France, consists in an 
institution called L' Hotel- Dieu. That is, God's 
House of hospitality . It is an hospital, or house 
of charity, for the reception and entertainment 
of indigent persons, those who, from age or 
other causes of infirmity, may have become 
destitute of the necessaries of life. This insti- 
tution is not, however, any thing of a burden 
upon the people ; the expenses of it are, in- 
deed, in great part, supported by voluntary 
contributions, that is to say, sums of money, 
which are given by charitable persons during 
their life-time, or bequeathed by them at their 
decease. It is the custom with us, as well as 
with the French, to give or bequeath money to 
charitable institutions; but, then, we have, 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 161 

besides charitable institutions, the institution of 
the work- house, towards the support of which 
charity is never depended upon at all, and 
which would certainly not be supported if that 
feeling" alone were appealed to in its behalf. 
The French have no work -houses, nothing 
which answers the purpose of a work-house, 
except the Hotel-Dieu. The Hotel-Dieu is 
not, like the work- house, to be met with very 
frequently. There is a place of this kind in 
every town of consequenee, but, you do not 
meet with it all over the country, as you do with 
the work-house in England. The H6tel-I>ieu 
seems to be an institution of very ancient date. 
As a building, it has always the appearance of 
great antiquity. Ic is generally situated in 
some conspicuous part of the town ; and the 
words " Hotel-Dieu " are written over its 
door-way. The work-houses in England, un- 
like the Hotel-Dieu, are by no means antique. 
A great part of them are either new buildings, 
erected expressly for the purpose, or, old farm- 
houses, formerly the habitations of happiness 
and plenty, and now converted into asylums 
for misery and want. The poor people that 
have to be provided for in the Hotel-Dieu are 
few in number, compared with those who 
move about and subsist upon what they 
get by begging ; and this is because people are, 



162 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

in France, much more inclined to give trifles 
of money to beggars than we are in England. 
The French do not so often refuse the petition 
of a beggar, because it does not remind them 
that they have been taxed in heavy poor-rates 
to maintain him ; and, the beggar himself is 
less likely to demand relief from the public 
funds when his immediate wants are supplied 
by the charity of individuals. In short, there 
is not that dreadful state of pauperism, in 
France, which there is in England. All poor 
people in France are free; they have the right 
of moving from one place to another, as much 
as people have that are rich ; they have a right 
to beg, and, unless they commit some overt act 
of an unlawful kind, no one molests or hinders 
them, How far would such toleration, with- 
out any poor-rates, agree with the gravity of 
our " Vagrant Act," and the number of our 
paupers ? 

211, The Hotel- Dieu is, also, a place for the 
taking care of poor children, of orphans, and 
of illegitimate children who have been aban- 
doned by their parents. They are here fed and 
clothed, and taught, until pretty well grown up, 
and are then placed out in situations where, 
for the future, they may provide for them- 
selves. . 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 163 



ROUEN — PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 

(Seven leagues from Loiwiers, through Pont de 
VArche.) 

Wednesday Night, 19 Nov. 

212. My horse, last evening, at about a 
league before I entered Louviers, was seized 
with a fit of the^ref, (cholic) so severe, that he 
wanted to lie down upon the road : I managed 
to get him on to the stable, and, owing to the 
skill and activity of a French horse-doctor, he 
was ready for the road again this morning. 

213. Between this place and Louviers, the 
arable part of the land is generally bare of 
fences. There are a great many apple trees to 
be seen, here, in every direction. The fruit of 
these trees is just of the same quality as that of 
all the apple trees I have seen growing in this 
way. Near Louviers there is a good deal of 
birch and oak wood ; and the cultivated part 
of the land, as a plain, is very agreeable. 

214. At Pont de l'Arche, a dirty little place, 
I cross the Seine, over a fine long bridge. Just 
after leaving this place, I have to go over a 
high hill, from the opposite side of which is 



164 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

presented a very beautiful view of the city of 
Rouen, (the capital of this fine province) and 
of the river Seine, which winds along, with a 
great many turnings, from Pont de l'Arche 
to this place, and through water-meadows and 
osier-beds as pretty as any that I ever saw. 
The road, after descending from the hill, is 
bounded, on one side, by the flat meadows, and, 
on the other side, by a range of very high and 
steep mountains, which are composed of chalk, 
flint, and limestone. 

215. Kouen is a noble city. It is situated 
on one edge of a most delightful valley, and 
close on the Seine, which river may, indeed, 
be said to pass through the city, for, on the 
bank of the river, which is opposite to that 
on which stands the original city, there is 
a good deal of building, and much business 
done in the way of trade. On entering Rouen 
there appears to be as much life and stir as 
there is in Paris ; the city is just such another 
place, excepting in respect to size. The looks 
of the people, here, as well as throughout the 
country parts of Normandy, constitute the 
most important circumstance in favour of this 
province. Normandy, excepting in the par- 
ticular of climate only, says much more for 
France than all the rest of the country that I 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 165 

have seen. The land is by far the richest, and 
the best cultivated ; the houses (farm-houses, 
as well as others) are more solid, more clean, 
in the insides of them, and kept in better 
general order. The people here, and those 
belonging to any other province through 
which I have passed, are as much unlike each 
other as though they belonged to two different 
nations. The men, in Normandy, are larger, 
better made, and fresher looking. The women 
are much the prettiest I have seen in France. 
They wear a cap (amongst the peasantry) that 
is quite a pattern of neatness. This cap is, in 
some parts of Normandy, very high in its 
shape, sometimes as much as thirty inches 
above the head, and it is so curious, in other 
particulars of its fashion, that I should endea- 
vour to give a more minute description of it, if 
I were at all conversant in such matters. It is 
called in France, le bonnet cauchoix. The fashion 
belongs peculiarly to the women of ihePays de 
Canx, which forms one district of the province 
of Normandy, and which Rouen stands just 
upon the borders of. The women of this dis- 
trict, who are called Cauchoises, are univer- 
sally allowed to be the prettiest in France. On 
my road from London to Dover, through 
Kent, I did, however, see more beauty than I 



166 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

have seen in all the other parts of France put 
together, Paris included. The women that I 
have seen before I entered this province were 
not to be compared with those of Normandy, 
in point of neatness in their dress and general 
appearance. The Normandy women have a 
good deal about them which answers the sense 
of the word "tidy:" a word which has so 
much significance in our language, and which 
the French language is a stranger to, and, in- 
deed, need be a stranger to, as far as relates to 
the greater part of the. people whose habits 1 
have had an opportunity to observe. The faces 
that appear under the bonnet cauchouv are 
very pretty. The cheeks of the Normandy 
women are quite as rosy, though their com- 
plexions are not so delicate, as those of Eng- 
lish women. There are not, I have noticed, 
so many black eyes, here, as I have seen else- 
where in France; but (for I must say it, to be 
just,) there are not sp many dirty faces! 

216. The contrast between Normandy and 
the rest of France, not only as regards the ap- 
pearance of the people, but as regards that of 
their houses, the face of their country, the cul- 
tivation of their farm?, and all that, in short, 
which strikes the eye of a traveller as he goes 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 167 

along the road, is so very remarkable, that one 
cannot help inquiring the reason why it 
should be. 

217. By some persons (and those apparently 
not the least intelligent) this striking differ- 
ence is mainly ascribed to the wide difference 
between the ancient laics and usages of Nor- 
mandy and those of the rest of France ; and 
especially as relating to the laws affecting the 
disposal and distribution of real property. Before 
the Revolution the law of primogeniture and of 
entail appears to have existed in a very exten- 
sive degree in Normandy, while it did not so 
exist in the other provinces of the kingdom, 
except with regard to a comparatively small 
part of the community. In Normandy the 
custom was to give all the real property to the 
sons, if there were sons 5 so that, as to the 
females, personal beauty was worth more than 
in countries where a different custom prevails; 
and it was a natural consequence, that the hand- 
somest women would find husbands first. At 
first sight it appears unjust to give all the estates 
to the sons ; but, these sons must have wives ; 
these wives must be women ; and, if John's 
two rich sons take (as they must) James's two 
pennyless daughters, while John's two penny- 
less daughters take (as they must) James's 



168 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

two rich sons; if this is the case, what wrong 
is done to the women? On the contrary; is it 
not to do them honour to establish a custom 
that makes it impossible that they can be mar- 
ried for their money ? All the pretty girls, at 
any rate, ought to be, I think, for the custom 
of Normandy. 

218. I mean, that which was the custom of 
Normandy ; for, as far as positive law can go, 
the Revolution has destroyed this custom. All 
is now laid level. The law does, in fact, make 
a man's will for him; and it divides and sub- 
divides his property, till, in some cases, a farm 
of 100 acres is, at the death of the owner, cut 
up into allotments of six or seven acres! It has 
been said, that " the law of primogeniture 
has but one child," and that it devotes all the 
rest to beggary. On the other hand it is said, 
that, even if this be admitted, the law of pri- 
mogeniture has an advantage over the law of 
scattering, as it may be called; for, that the law 
of primogeniture has one child, while the other 
has no child at all; that the law of primogeniture 
devotes (allowing it to do this) to beggary all 
but one, while the law of scattering saves not 
one, but disperses the whole, and makes them 
all beggars. For, if a man possess an estate, 
each child is brought up as the child of the 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 169 

owner of that estate ; but what is each but a 
beggar (compared with his father), when each 
possesses a dozen or two of acres of land ? 

219. It is not for me to venture to speak 
positively upon a subject of such vast ex- 
tent and vast importance ; but I hear, on all 
sides, here in Normandy, great lamentations 
on account of the effects of this revolutionary 
law. They tell me, that it has dispersed 
thousands upon thousands of families, who had 
been on the same spots for centuries ; that it 
is daily operating in the same way ; that it has, 
in a great degree, changed the state of the 
farm- buildings ; that it has caused the land to 
be worse cultivated ; that it has caused great 
havoc amongst timber trees ; and, there are 
persons who do not scruple to assert, that 
society in France will become degraded in 
the extreme, unless the law be changed in this 
respect. 

220. It must be confessed, that this law of 
scattering naturally leads to dilapidation and 
waste. It is not natural to expect that an 
owner of a farm, for instance, will have the 
same regard for, or consider himself bound to 
take the same care of, the farm which he has 
purchased of a stranger, as he would of the 



$70 . A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

farm upon which he had himself been born 
and bred up, the farm which his father had 
tilled, and which he had inherited in his 
father's name. Nor can it be any more ex- 
pected, that the father, while he lives, should 
pay the same attention to the farm which is to 
be sold away, or cut up into lots sorely against 
his will, as he would to that which must re- 
main in the hands of his son after he is gone. 
If he have to build the farm-house, it is not 
likely to be built with so much care, or to last 
so long ; his farm is not likely to be so well 
enclosed or so much beautified ; he will not 
take the same pains about making the neat 
and lasting quick-set hedge round his field, 
or in planting trees to be the future ornaments 
of his dwelling, when he reflects that all these 
sources of welfare, comfort, and good appear- 
ance, may, in a very short time, become the 
possessions of some one whom he does not even 
know, and, consequently, cannot care any 
thing about. For these reasons, as they tell 
me, an astonishing alteration has taken place 
in the province of Normandy, since the begin- 
ning of the revolution. The farms here, are 
not, I am assured, in any thing like the same 
fine condition that they used to be, although 
they are still the handsomest and best culti- 
vated in France, The people do not now take 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 171 

the same pride in the cultivation and embel- 
lishment of their farms. In all matters apper- 
taining to farms, farm-houses, or whatever be- 
longs to the occupation of farmers and country 
people, there is less attention paid to charac- 
ter or appearance, 

221. 1 have been assured, that, in many 
families of owners of land, the several mem- 
bers have come to an agreement with each 
other to act acccording to the ancient custom, 
and thus prevent the parcelling out of their 
estates and the extinction of their families. 
This may now-and-then take place, but ge- 
nerally it cannot ; and it is clear, that if the 
present law remain, the land must all be cut 
up into little bits ; that a farm-house must be- 
come a rare sight ; and that a tree worthy of 
the name of timber, will scarcely be seen in a 
whole day's ride. 

222. No wonder that the government of 
France should be anxious to bring the country 
back to something like the old laws and cus- 
toms, as to the disposal and distribution of the 
land. But, it is, 1 am told, by no means cer- 
tain, that it will succeed in the attempt which 
it is said to be about to make for the effecting 
of this purpose. There naturally exists great 

I 2 



172 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

jealousy of every proposition which seems to 
look back with longing eyes towards the feudal 
system. The law of primogeniture has been so 
much censured, that, only to talk of it, rouses 
the resentment of many persons in France. 
Something, however, must, sooner or later, be 
done to counteract the law of scattering. There 
must, for instance, be public forests, or plan- 
tations, for the rearing of timber ; for the law 
of primogeniture is as necessary to make 
ancient trees as it is to make ancient families. 
This is a subject full of interest, full of im- 
portant considerations, one that I should like 
to see ably discussed, but certainly one that I 
never bestowed a thought on, till I entered 
this famous province of Normandy. 

223. It has been remarked, by some Eng- 
lishmen who have been in France, that the 
French farmers have hardly any barns, or 
other places in which to deposit their corn. 
This is very much the case ; it is so even in 
Normandy, though not so much so here as in 
other parts of the country. The French farm- 
ers do not make any large ricks of corn, as 
we do in England. They either put their 
corn into small stacks, or put it away under 
the roofs of their cattle sheds, and other out- 
houses, in which situation it is not seen. It 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 1/3 

is, however, the custom with French farmers, 
to thrash out their corn very soon. A great 
part of the crop is thrashed out as soon as it 
is harvested. Buckwheat and oats, and beans 
also, I believe, are very commonly thrashed 
in the fields where they are grown. By these 
means the farmers get their harvest into a 
smaller compass, and do not require so much 
room to house it in. This is, as in America, the 
effect of climate more than of any thing else. 



Thursday, 20 Nov. 

224. The manufactures of Rouen are very 
extensive and various. This city, although it 
is situated at not less than thirty leagues from 
the mouth of the Seine, may almost be said 
to be a sea-port. The far greater part of the 
goods of all kinds, which are brought into or 
exported from the Northern parts of France, 
pass through the medium of this place. All 
the merchandize that comes to Paris, from 
Havre, must go to or past this city. And a 
large portion of the manufactures, raw mate- 
rials, and provisions of all kinds, that are sent 
for exportation to Havre, from various parts 
of the country, are first brought, by land, to 



174 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

Rouen, and are then sent down the Seine to 
Havre. 

225. The population of Rouen is about 
80,000 inhabitants. The finest of the churches 
here are those of St. Ouen, St. Maclou, and 
La Madeleine ; besides which there is a very 
fine and ancient cathedral. 

226. The church called St. Ouen, is one 
which has been dedicated to Ouen, who was 
Archbishop of Rouen many centuries ago. 
Ouen was born in the environs of Soisous, and 
was elected Archbishop of this city in the 
year 640. He became celebrated for his men- 
tal endowments, and obtained great authority 
in state affairs. The different princes who 
reigned in France, during the time of Ouen, 
were at war with one another, and the influ- 
ence of Ouen established peace again among 
them. It was upon his return from a nego- 
tiation for this purpose, that Ouen died, in 
689. — He is said to have written the life of 
St. Eloy, which is in Latin. A voluminous 
account of the life of St. Ouen, in French, 
by P. Francois Pommery, was published in 
1662. — There is a little place, near Pont de 
L'Arche, which is called Port de St. Ouen. 
This place takes its name, no doubt, as well 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 1?5 

as the old church, from that of the Archbishop 

OUEN. 

227. It would be somewhat needless for me 
to describe the forms and ceremonies of Roman 
Catholic worship. But I cannot help noticing 
one important particular connected with the 
going to church in this country. There are no 
pews allowed to be made in the churches here. 
The priests have benches, or large chairs, 
highly decorated, to sit upon ; but the congre- 
gation flock all together. The stone floors of the 
churches are entirely open, and the only sort 
of seats used by those who attend the service 
are common rush-bottomed chairs, of which 
there are a great many kept in every church. 
The chairs are piled up on one side, when 
there is no service going on in the church, so 
that the floor of the church is as open as that 
of an English barn. A trifle of money is paid 
to an attendant, by the persons who ask for 
chairs. When people are at church, in this 
country, there is no sort of distinction made 
between classes or ranks. People enter the 
churches at all times, every day in the week, 
to say their prayers, and to sprinkle them- 
selves with the holy-water, as they are pass- 
ing by upon business, or otherwise. There 
is nothing of that contesting for " the chief 



176 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

seats' 9 at church, as is too much the case with 
some of the most constant church-goers in 
England. There are, indeed, no " chief seats'' 
to be found in the churches here. In England 
the church is, by many folks, looked upon as 
a sort of theatre, or a place to show off in.. 
The Jlnest pew seems to contain the most pious 
worshipper. What is there more common, 
in an English parish, than the quarrels about 
the " best pew." While the French people 
are kneeling to expiate their sins upon the 
stone floors of their churches, we forget our 
sins, and add to the stock, in a squabble about 
who shall have the gaudiest seat or cushion, 
upon which to sit or kneel down to protest 
that we are deeply impressed with feelings of 
humility. 

228. To-day I saw the statue of Joan of 
Arc (La Pucelle d f Orleans), who was burned 
alive in this city by the English, in the year 
1430. The statue stands in a little square, 
and upon the very spot where she was burned. 
The figure is represented as a woman dressed 
in military uniform, and holding a sword in 
her hand. 



PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 177 

NEDFCHATEL— ^PROVINCE OF NORMANDY. 

(Ten leagues from Rouen, through Le Vert de Gal- 
lant and Boissiers.) 

Friday Night, 21 Nov. 

229. Le Vert de Gallant consists in nothing 

more than a house of posting, a Poste mix 

Chevauo;, upon the road ; and Boissiers is but 

a little hamlet, of about a dozen houses. 

280. The country here is open, and rather 
flat, excepting a chain of hill which runs 
across at Boissiers. Little of wood-land, but 
a great many apple-trees of the same kind 
that I have before noticed. On my road to- 
day, I see the land ploughed in a manner dif- 
ferent from almost any ploughing that I have 
seen since I got into the neighbourhood of 
Briarre. All the way from that place, to 
Neufchatel, or hereabouts, the land is, in ge- 
neral, ploughed in the manner described in 
paragraph 94. Here they plough the land, as 
we do in most parts of England, into wide 
lands; and although the farms are nothing 
like so beautiful as those in the interior of 
Normandy, the ploughing upon them is much 
better done. 

231. The implements of husbandry in France 



178 A RIDE IN* FRANCE. 

are, as well as those with us, of great variety. 
The principal difference between the ploughs, 
carts, wagons, harrows, and the like, in France, 
and such implements in England, is, that 
these things seem to be, in this country, on 
account of their comparative rudeness of 
fashion, about the same as I should suppose 
must have been used in England a great many 
years, perhaps a century, ago. The farming 
implements here are not, generally, so heavy 
as ours. They are nothing like so neatly made,, 
but answer their purpose pretty nearly as well 
as those of English farmers. Some of the 
ploughs made use of in the neighbourhood of 
Briarre, and in other places where the land 
is light, and the climate warmer than it is 
here, have scarcely any thing of a mould-board 
attached to them. The land is hardly turned 
over at all. The ploughshare gives it a 
shallow stir; and the farmer (unlike the far- 
mer in England) seems to place more reliance 
on the climate than he does on the depth of 
the ploughing which his land receives. — The 
wi?mowing machine is the most complicated 
piece of machinery that I see used by the 
French farmers; and this is not common 
among them. 

232. I cannot convey a more correct idea 



PROVINCE OP NORMANDY. 179 

of French farming, as far as taste or fashion 
goes, than by a description of a kind of gate, 
which is very common upon farms, through- 
out the country. The curious part of this 
gate is the upper bar of it, which is formed out 
of the stem of a good sized tree, that has been 
felled, without cutting off any more than just 
the fibrous parts of its root ; so that the stool- 
moor remains in its rough state; and the piece 
of timber attached to it, after being reduced 
to the size and shape required^ is placed, so 
as precisely to balance itself, across one of the 
gate-posts^ upon which it swings by means of 
an iron pivot, driven into the top of the post. 
All the minor bars, and cross-bars, are fas- 
tened to this principal part of the gate; and 
the whole is balanced by the stool-moor, the 
counteracting weight of which, at the oppo\- 
site side of the gate-post, keeps all the rest 
of the gate in its place. 

233. There are some manufactories of cot- 
ton yarn, and of muslin, at this place. The 
men employed in the factories earn from 25 
sous to 3 francs a-day, which, considering the 
price of food and raiment, is very high pay. 
Neufchatel is celebrated, throughout all 
France, for a kind of cheese which is made 
here, and which is by far the best that I have 



180 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

found in any part of this country. It is made 
of cream ; and the cheeses, which are very 
small, sell, at market, by the dozen. A dozen 
of the best of these cheeses, weighing, gene- 
rally, about 3 lbs. the dozen, sells for 3 francs, 
or nearly that ; making the cheese to be 1 
franc, or 10& English, a pound. 

234. The hay in this part of France is very 
fine. Lucerne, sainfoin, and meadow hay, are 
all worth, at retail, about 10 sous the botte, 
allowing the botte to weigh 12 lbs. This is 
dear for France. It is at the rate of about 
3L 12«. an English ton. Much dearer than 
the corn in France. However, this is the re- 
tail price; 



ABBEVILLE — PROVINCE OF PICARDY. 

(Twelve leagues from Neufchatel, through Foucar- 
mont, Blangy, and Huppuy. 

Saturday Night, 22 Nov. 

235. The country I have passed over to- 
day is more interesting. The land, on the 
other side of Blangy, which is but a small vil- 
lage, as well as Fou cannon t and Huppuy, 
abounds in hills of stone and -chalk* From 



PROVINCE OP PICARDY. 181 

Blangy to this place the prospect is not so 
fine. Blangy, situated in a rich valley, which 
lies open for some extent, is sourrounded by 
an immense forest of beech, called Le Forest 
d'Eau. I am told that this forest extends, in 
one direction, for as much as thirteen leagues. 
It formerly belonged to different branches of 
the Royal Family of the Bourbons ; but the 
greater part of it, I believe, was so disposed of 
during the Revolution, that not much of the 
confiscated property has been regained by its 
former possessors. The Duchess of Orleans, 
who was dispossessed of that portion of it 
which belonged to her, has, by some means, 
succeeded in getting it back again. — I saw a 
great number of women and children, in this 
forest, collecting the leech-nuts, which fall 
from the trees about this time of the year. 
They sell the nuts, after collecting a quantity 
of them together, to people who make oil from 
them. 

236. The town of Abbeville is situated on 
the river Somme. Its population is 18,000. 
It is nearly, if not quite, upon a level with 
Louviers, as a manufacturing place. Some of 
the manufactories of silks, woollen clotlis, and 
cottons, are very extensive. The journeymen 
who work in the manufactories get from 25 



182 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

sous to 4 francs a-day.— -The machinery for 
spinning, and the looms, are, almost all of 
them, propelled by the power of steam. 



HESDJN PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 

(Eight leagues from Abbeville, through Canchy.) 

Sunday Night, 23 Nov. 

237. I can easily perceive that I am among 
a different sort of people here, from those that 
I have left in Normandy. I recognise the 
same kind of countenances that I saw as I 
went through this province and that of Pi- 
cardy to Paris. The little children, that run 
out from the houses here, look cheerful, and 
comfortably clad, but their faces are a much 
stronger evidence of inward content, than they 
are of the external application of soap and water. 

238. From Abbeville to this place the 
country is very much the same as that be- 
tween St. Omer's and St. Pol. The land is 
strong and good, but flat, very little enclosed, 
and without any of that beauty of variety 
which belongs to Normandy, Maine, and Tou- 
raine. There are no water meadows here, 
and very few hedge-rows, and but little wood 
land, 



PROVINCE OP ARTOIS. 183 

239. Canchy is but a little village. Hesdin, 
the population of which is about 6000, is the 
strongest fortified town that I have passed 
through. The ramparts of the town are very 
high. The place is so far guarded by the 
water which flows all round it, that you can- 
not approach the town without first crossing 
one of the long bridges that lead to the gate- 
ways. The wet ditches and the water-mea- 
dows, by which the town is surrounded, and 
which contain a great quantity of stagnant 
water, are said to render this situation un- 
healthy. 

240. The fuel chiefly made use of by the 
people about here, is that of peat. Peat is 
much burned in those parts of France in 
which there is less wood to be gotten, and 
where water-meadows,or marshy lands, abound. 



Monday Night, 24 Nov. 

241. On leaving Hesdin, I passed through 
a forest, which belongs to the King, and is of 
considerable extent. The land here is good. 
The face of the country is much the same as 



184 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

that which I had in view from Canchy to 
Hesdin. 



242. The farmers here make great use of 
chalk. I see the people digging it out of little 
wells, which they sink in the fields, the foun- 
dation of the soil of which is, about here, a 
complete bed of chalk, or marl. They dig 
a hole, sufficiently large to supply manure for 
about half an acre of land, and carry out the 
chalk hi baskets , and lay it, as we do in En- 
gland, in heaps. Their having to carry all 
the chalk by hand, induces them to dig many 
holes, or wells, in the chalking of a large 
field, for the sake of saving labour. Women, 
as well as men, are engaged in this sort of 
work. 

243. There are no cottages in France. I 
mean, by cottages, such dwellings as those 
which are inhabited by the families of la- 
bourers in England. If happiness be essential 
to the existence of these cottages, which have 
so much interested travellers in our country, 
and which make us delighted with country 
life ; these cottages, which form so beautiful 
a feature in the rural part of our affairs, that 
even our poets have loved to dwell upon the 
subject : if happiness in the inmates be indis- 



PROVINCE OF ART015. 185 

pensable to preserve the character of these 
little dwellings, would not present appearances 
make us fear that some Frenchman may yet 
have to tell his countrymen, that there are 
no cottages in England? I hope, however, 
that no Frenchman will ever be able, with 
truth, to say this ; for, of all the subjects upon 
which I can decide in favour of my own 
country, after contrasting her with that of the 
French, there is no one which does her more 
honour than that which conveys its idea in the 
name of cottage. The French have no word 
by which to translate this name. They call a 
cottage a caban, which means, strictly speak- 
ing, cabin. What we mean by the word 
cabin is, in English, something very different 
from cottage. It has, rather, a miserable mean- 
ing. We say cabin, when we speak, for in- 
stance, of the thing which is made as a shelter 
for themselves by people who have been ship- 
wrecked upon a desert coast : and, really, the 
caban of a peasant in Picardy bears more re- 
semblance to something erected under such 
circumstances, than it does to the pretty cot- 
tage of an English labourer, the interior of 
which seems to court comfort through the 
medium of cleanliness and care, and in front 
of the door-way of which you oftener see a 
really beautiful flower-garden, than (as is the 



186 A RIDE IN PRANCE. 

case with the Frenchman's cahan) the un- 
seemly sight of a heap of rubbish or manure. 

244. The neat, the flower-garden cottage, 
is, it would seem, peculiar to England; for, 
I have always heard of the dunghill door- ways 
of the dwellings of the Scotch and Irish la- 
bourers ; and I can myself speak as to those 
of the United States of America, where the 
farmer very seldom seems to care a great deal 
about the neatness of his yard and his garden, 
but, where the mere labourer, though he earn a 
dollar a-day, and eat meat three times a-day, 
has, in general, a hole to live in that the 
poorest of our English labourers would be 
ashamed of. It is generally a " caban" made 
of boards, without any garden, or any thing 
that seems to say, that it is the abode of com- 
fort, i 

245. But, notwithstanding this slovenliness, 
the American labourer is much better off than 
ours. And so is the French labourer. His 
habits are what we call slovenly ; but he has 
never known the contrary. By the side of 
the obscurest lanes in England you will see 
the most beautiful flower-gardens, with little 
gravel or sand walks, before little, old, cot- 
tages. These gardens are not intended for 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 187 

show. They are seen by nobody but the 
owners. It is taste ; it is habit ; most admir- 
able, most meritorious, these are ; but, those 
to whom they are unknown do not experience 
the want of them. 

246. The French labourer is better fed than 
the English labourer now is. He is better 
clothed too. His stock of clothes is greater. 
His body is not exposed, as the bodies of a 
large portion of our labourers now are. He 
is more dirty; but not so ragged; less neat 
about his dwelling, but he has about three 
times the quantity of food. 

247. I saw, to-day, several men and women 
digging together, in the open fields, with a 
spade (the ordinary spade made use of in 
France), which had a long handle, and was 
very much like the narroAV spade which is 
made use of in draining in England. The 
women dug uncommonly well : they stuck 
the spade into the ground, without putting 
their foot upon it at all, and threw over the 
full spits of this heavy soil, as quick, and with 
as much apparent ease to themselves, as the 
men did who worked alongside of them. The 
ground that these people were digging was a 
little plat, which, in exchange for services 



188 A RIDE IN PRANCE. 

rendered to the land-owner, or a part of the 
money paid them for such services, they were 
enabled to rent. It is a common thing, here, 
for a labourer to be the renter of a little piece 
of land, in this way. Instead of being em- 
ployed iu such toilsome labour, the women, if 
they had been the wives or daughters of En- 
glish labourers, would have been at home, at- 
tending to the state of their cottages, and 
preserving that general system of neatness and 
order, which makes so great a difference be- 
tween the Englishman's cottage and the 
Frenchman's caban, — Of the food of the French 
peasant bread is a principal article ; and it is, 
in France, as it appears natural that it should 
be, the most abundant article in the way of 
food. All sorts of vegetables, in this country, 
give way to bread. A less quantity of meat 
is requisite to a French labourer, than what 
labourers (when they can get it) are used to 
consume in England. The economy in cooking 
here, is such, that the same quantity of animal 
food which we eat in England would feed al- 
most double the number of persons in France. 
Soup is a food of which the French are so 
fond, that they can scarcely bear to go with- 
out it. The best soup they like best; but, 
they like soup, in general, so much, that even 
soup maigre is better to them than no soup at 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 189 

all. The French do not cook so much meat 
in large pieces as we do ; they cut it up into 
small bits, and stew, or fricasee it, most fre- 
quently. It is this mode of cooking among 
them, no doubt, which has led to the suppo- 
sition, which I do not think well founded, that 
the French are more abstinent with regard to 
meat than we are. 



Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, 
25, 26, and 27 Nov. 

248. The cause of my remaining so long a 
time as three days at St. Oraer's has been the 
discovery of some old friends of my father's, 
with whom he resided (en pension) about 
thirty years ago, when he was in this country. 
I endeavoured to find them as I went through 
here before, but without success. As soon as 
I got back here again I made further search, 
and at last found them out. 

249. I have not, till this time, had any op- 
portunity of being in a French Court of Jus- 
tice. On Wednesday there was a court sitting, 
at this place, to try criminals, at which I at- 
tended. I witnessed one trial, which was 
that of a young woman, who had been arrested 



190 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

in the neighbourhood of St. Pol, on the charge 
of stealing a cow. She pleaded, not guilty ; 
but it was clearly proved, that she was guilty; 
and the main circumstance urged in her fa- 
vour, was, that of her not having stolen the 
cow during the night, but in the day time. The 
French law does not punish the crime of theft 
with so much severity when committed in 
the day-time, as it does when committed 
during the night. The law, it appeared, had 
not specified the exact difference between the 
time of the day and that of the night. The 
lawyer who defended, or who wished to miti- 
gate the punishment of, the woman, argued, 
that, as she had stolen the cow at three o'clock 
in the morning, the theft ought to be consi- 
dered as having been committed in the day- 
time. But the chief judge interpreted the 
law differently; and, after consulting with 
the rest of those who were upon the bench, 
decided that the cow had been stolen in the 
night, and sentenced the woman to thirteen 
month's imprisonment. The prisoner, during 
the trial, sat between two gens d'armes (who 
are officers of police, but dressed in complete 
military uniform), in a situation which was 
elevated from the floor by a little platform, 
round which there was an iron railing. On 
the opposite side of the room sat the jury, 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 191 

(twelve men) ; and at one end of the room was 
the bench, upon which there were, I think, 
seven judges, all of whom wore black gowns, 
much like the gowns worn by our lawyers, 
the president of the court having, besides this, 
a scarlet scarf over his shoulders, by way, I 
suppose, of distinction. The lawyers here do 
not wear wigs. They wear, judges and all, 
a curious sort of cap, which is high upon 
their heads, and much wider round at the 
top of the crown than it is at the bottom, in- 
creasing gradually in width, as it runs up. It 
has no brim, like that of a common hat, but, 
in all other respects, it is very nearly of the 
same shape as the hats which have, of late, 
been worn by the dandies of London ; very 
like a dandy's hat, with the brim cut off. The 
cap is, ordinarily, made of black cloth, but 
that of the president is of black velvet, and has 
a band of gold lace round the lower part of it. 

250. Crimes are by no means so frequent 
in France as in England. According to the 
accounts which I have received in four of the 
Departments through which I have passed, 
there are not half so many prisoners in France 
as in England alone, though the population of 
France is about three times that of England ! 



192 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

This is a melancholy, and, indeed, to us, a 
disgraceful fact. The truth is, the people of 
France are well off; and those of England are, 
for the greater part, constantly suffering from 
want. Then, there is the fertile cause for im- 
prisonment in England, the game-code, of 
which the French do, in reality, know no- 
thing. Only eight persons have been executed 
in Paris during the last three years. Alas ! 
London : the blood of how many has stained 
your pavement ! 

251. This happy state of the people makes 
the family of Bourbon secure. 1 have now 
travelled a great distance in France; have 
been in almost all sorts of company ; have seen 
no restraint in any company ; and never have 
heard one expression hostile to the Bourbons. 
People talk freely, and I have frequently heard 
them talk about the Spanish war. Generally, 
however, as a matter of mere news ; and, the 
impression upon my mind is, that the people 
in general care very little about what we call 
politics. They seem to have never known what 
was before the Revolution ; and, they seem 
perfectly well satisfied with the result of it. 
If I had mixed with politicians, at Paris, I 
might have heard what would have led to a 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 193 

different conclusion; but I took the commu- 
nity as I found it; and I have here set down 
the result of my observations. 

252. I was prepared for some marks of that 
prejudice, said to exist here against the English. 
Few persons have, I believe, (at least, I hope,) 
taken me for any thing but an Englishman ; 
and, during the whole of my journey, I have 
met with not a bit more rudeness, neglect, or 
incivility, than I should have been liable to if 
I had been travelling in England. 

253. I had read Mr. Arthur Young's ac- 
count of bad rooms, bad beds, nasty servants, 
and the like. I have met with none of these. 
Frequently not fine ; but seldom indeed not 
good. Plenty of good food always, for horse 
as well as for man ; and never any thing like 
impatience or ill-temper in the servants. Say 
others what they please : I say a most civil, 
agreeable, and honest people. 

254. The people seem to me to think very 
little about the taxes ; and, indeed, it is not 
very easy to meet with a person who can tell 
you any thing about them. It is curious, that 
there is just the same talk of a vast increase of 
population here that there is in England. 

K 



194 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

Every body that you talk to on the subject, 
seems to take it for granted, that France is 
much more populous than she was a few 
years ago. Has England caught this strange 
whim from France ; or France from England. 

255. I have been very much pleased with 
the state of religious affairs in France. Here 
appear to be no disputes between the people 
and the priests ; and, as far as I can perceive, 
there is but one kind of religion ; which must, 
I think, be a great advantage to all parties. 
Which is right and which is wrong of the 
many kinds of religion in England, I shall 
not take upon me to decide \ but, I must 
say, that I here witness the happy effects of 
there being only one kind. The priests every 
where seem to be a very modest and unas- 
suming set of men. They are appointed to 
their parishes by the Bishops. They do not 
lead lazy lives. They visit, and diligently 
visit, every sick person. They are in their 
churches, on many of the days of every month, 
soon after daylight. On Sundays they ge- 
nerally say mass three times. They teach all 
the children their religious duties. For this 
purpose they have them assembled in the 
church itself, on certain days, and mostly at a 
very early hour in the morning, which must 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 195 

have an excellent effect on the morals of the 
children. There are none of the people too 
poor to be noticed, and in the kindest manner 
too, by these priests, who really appear to an- 
swer to the appellation of pastor. 

256. Never, while this is the case, will any 
thing resembling our Methodist Meetings rise 
up here. It is certainly a great feather in the 
cap of the Catholic Church, that France has 
returned to her with so much unanimity 3 
and that, too, without any force, without any 
attempt at force, and without any possible 
motive in the mass of the people except that 
of a belief in the truth of her doctrines. But, 
as far as I can venture to speak, I must say, 
that I think, that the gentle, the amiable, the 
kind, the humble, the truly pious conduct of 
the priests is the great cause of that strong 
attachment which the Catholics every where 
bear to their church. I give, as it becomes 
me, this opinion with great deference to the 
judgment of the reader; but, bare justice 
to these priests compels me to say, that I see 
them every where held in high esteem, and, 
that they seem to me not to be esteemed be- 
yond their merit?. Let the reader suppose 
an English parson (and there may be such an 
one in England), abstaining from marriage in 

K 2 



196 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

order that he may devote his whole time and 
affection to his flock ; let the reader suppose 
him visiting every sick person in his parish, 
present at every death in it, comforting the 
dying, consoling the survivors; let the reader 
suppose such a parson teaching every child in 
the parish its religious duties, conversing with 
each almost daily ; let the reader suppose such 
a parson, and can he suppose that the people 
of this parish would ever run after a Metho- 
dist f The great thing is, however, that the 
people are more sober, honest, and happy in 
consequence of having this kind and zealous 
parson. This is the great thing to think of; 
and, it appears to me that, in this respect, 
France is, at this time, in a very excellent 
state. 

257. The giving of credit is much less in 
fashion in France than in England. Indeed 
the laws of France discourage it : wisely, in 
my opinion ; but they do it at any rate. 
Traders must have a licence from the govern- 
ment to carry on their trades ; but, this is 
not necessary if they do not deal on credit. 
If they have not the licence they cannot be sued 
for debts contracted in their business, and 
cannot sue for debts contracted with them by 
others. If, therefore, they choose to deal 



PROVINCE OF ARTOIS. 197 

solely for ready money, they need no licence. 
The licence operates, therefore, as a tax on 
giving and taking credit. Several persons, with 
whom I have conversed in France, think this 
tax a very wise measure; and 1 have generally 
found, that there is, in this country, a rooted 
dislike to adventurous dealings ; or, as the 
cant term is, speculations. This dislike to 
gambling trade makes commerce less showy, 
but much more solid. Adventurous dealings 
certainly are not quite free from dishonest in- 
tention. The habit of carrying on such deal- 
ings tends, I am disposed to think, to wear 
away whatever it finds of steady industry and 
honesty. The honesty of the French in all 
their dealings ; their punctuality in paying 
their debts ; their great dislike to be in debt : 
these are acknowledged by all who know 
them, and who are just : and these make up 
for many and many little faults. 



CALAIS — PROVINCE OF ARTOtS. 

(Ten leagues from St. Omers.) 

Friday, 28 Nov. 

258. Here I am again, with the white cliffs 

of England once more in my sight, after having 



198 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

been seven weeks and two days in France, 
and having travelled over much about eight 
hundred English miles. Let me, then, look at 
my purse, and count the cost of this most 
agreeable and instructive ride. From my 
landing at this place, on the 9th of October, 
to my entry into it again this day, my whole 
expenditure has been 161. 10s. 9Jd. or 396 
francs, 18| sous ; or, six shilli7igs and seven- 
pence a-day for me and my horse ; including, 
however, nearly a pound sterling on account 
of my horse's cutting of his foot. I have not 
tried to be saving. I have lived very well ; 
always put up at the best inns; eaten and 
drunk as others did ; have been rather liberal 
than otherwise to servants ; and have a horse 
full as fat as when I landed him. These ex- 
penses, per day, for myself and horse, are not 
much more than the amount of the day's 
wages of a labourer at New York. When we 
look at these expenses, we cannot wonder 
that so many English people are now in 
France ; indeed, the wonder is, that thousands 
more are not here. 

259. I cannot look across the Channel 
without contrasting the stir, the bustle, the 
energetic motions, and the anxious looks, that 
I shall there again behold, with the tranquil 



PROVINCE OP ARTOIS. 199 

and happy carelessness of the scenes that I 
leave behind me. There seems to be more 
energy, more force, more human power, ex- 
isting in one mile of England than in all 
France. The difference is perfectly surpris- 
ing; but, it by no means follows, that the 
latter country has not, mile for mile, as much 
of solid means as the former. France has just 
shown, that she can send forth immense ar- 
mies without the effect being felt by, and 
without the fact being scarcely known to, the 
mass of the people. The Spanish war seems 
to have disturbed nobody and nothing. A 
few years ago it was supposed by many in 
England, that the energies of France were 
subdued for ever. Those who thought thus 
had not seen France ; or, had not, at least, 
duly estimated her immense resources, I 
pray to God, that those resources may never 
make her a match for England; but it 
is not the part of prudence or of valour, to 
shut our eyes to danger, or to under-rate that 
against which we shall, sooner or later, have 
to contend. 



200 A RIDE. IN FRANCE. 



A GENERAL VIEW OF THE FINANCES OF FRANCE. 

260. 1 found it very difficult to get any pub- 
lications on the Finances ; but, I was, by a 
gentleman at Paris, assisted in getting at do- 
cuments to enable me to make the following 
statement of receipts and expenditures for the 
year 1822 $ and this statement is, I am satis- 
tied, correct as to all material points. 

" 261. The taxes are, 1. A direct tax on land; 
2. On persons and moveable property ; 3. On 
trades; that is to say, licences; 4. Stamp taxes; 
5. Customs; 6. Excise. All governments seem 
to have the same taste as to taxation. The 
American Congress have not, as yet, come to a 
settled excise tax; but they have been nibbling 
at it two or three times. They have been 
throwing it, as if in sport, over the necks of 
the people ; and, then, when the people began 
to look cross, pulled it away again, pretending 
they were joking ! In case of another war, it 
will, perhaps, be fastened round their necks 
for ever. 



VIEW OF THE FINANCES. 



201 



RECEIPTS FOR 1822. 

Francs. 
From land and landed income 273,000,000. . . 

Persons and moveables 41,000,000. . . 

Trades 31,000,000... 

Stamps 157,000,000. . . 

Customs and Excise 268,000,000. . . 

F. 770,000,000 



Sterling-: 
11,400,000 
1,700,000 
1,300,000 
6,500,000 
11,100,000 

£32,000,000 



EXPENDITURE FOR 1822. 

Francs. Sterling. 

Debt (Public) 178,000,000 7,400,000 

Royal Family 1. 34,000,000.... 1,400,000 

Ministry of Justice ^ 17,000,000 700,000 

Pensions in this Department J 325,000. . . . 14,000 

Foreign Affairs 6,000,000.... 240,000 

Interior (ordinary service) . . l 11,100,000 460,000 

Pensions in this Department J 580,000. . . . 24,000 

The Church 23,400,000.... 975,000 

Public Works, Roads, and 

Bridges 31,000,000 1,300,000 

Charitable Institutions 2,200,000. . . . 91,000 

Contingencies 33,500,000 1,390,000 

War (active service) 173,200,000 7,200,000 

Half Pay 16,000,000 660,000 

Marine 52,000,000.... 2,200,000 

Ministry of Finance 75,000,000 3,100,000 

Charges of Collection and Ma- 
nagement 116,500,000 4,812,000 

F. 769,S05,000 £31,966,000 

k5 



202 A RIDE IN FRANCE. 

262. The reader will please to observe, that, 
in turning the francs into pounds, I have not 
carried the calculations further than the first 
two or three figures towards the right hand. 
If the calculations had been carried quite out, 
the totals, under the heads of sterling, would 
have been a little different from what they 
now are. This is, however, of no conse- 
quence. The above is quite nice enough for 
every useful purpose. 

263. This statement offers matter for inte- 
resting observation, particularly in a compa- 
rative point of view. The French say, that 
they have thirty millions of persons from whom 
to collect this revenue. TheC/iwrc/i,wesee, costs 
these thirty millions of persons only nine hundred 
and seventy-five thousand pounds a-year ; while 
an army, a division of which is fit to invade 
and over-run Spain, costs but seven millions 
a-year ; which is not a third more than that 
singular body in England, which is, with much 
greater propriety than elegance, much more 
truth than prudence, called The Dead fFeight. 
Reflections I must, however, leave to the 
reader, contenting myself with the hope that 
the facts which I have brought together may 
be found to be not wholly destitute of utility. 

THE END. 



INDEX. 



Abbeville, town of paragraph 236 

Aicanois, vineyard at 45 

Aire, town of 34 

Alan^on, city of , 180 

Amiens, city of 42 

cathedral of 42 

Animals, treatment of tame 138, 139 

Apple and pear trees 45 

Ardres, town of 24 

Asses 138 

Auron, the river 125 

Azincour, village of 37 

Beans, kidney (haricdts) » 56 

Beans, cultivation and use of 35 

Beauvoir, Chateau de 91 

Beggars in France 210 

Benedict, Convent of St 160 

Bertin, St 31 

Bertin, Church of St 27. 31 



INDEX. 

Bill of the Author's expenses, at Cosne 117 

at Calais 15, 16 

at St. Omers 32 

at Amiens 43 

atDartford 17 

at Paris 71 

Boarding and lodging, cost of 189 

Botte, corruption of the word 17 

Boucmaison, village of . 40 

Bourbon, Due de 61 

Bourges, city of 125 

cathedral of , 126 

Buonaparte ^ 

Bread, price of, quality of 48, 1 67 

Briarre, village of 89, 91 

Buzancois, town of 142 

Caen, the horses of 195 

Calais, town of 17 

Canchy, village of . . , 239 

Castles, or country seats 77 

Catholic church, the 256 

Cauchoises, the women so called 215 

Chartreux, Le Convent des 29 

Chailly, village of 78 

Chantilly, town of 58 

Chateauroux, city of 131 

Chatillon sur Indre, town of 142 

Chestnut-trees 90 

Church, going to, in France 227 

Cider 45, 198 

Clermont, town of 57 

Climate 112 

Clion, village of 142 



INDEX. 

Clothes, price of 208 

Curmnissaire, or commissioner of customs &e 12 

Common, or waste land in France 21 

Conches, forest of * 193 

town of 203 

Cooking, French mode of 32 

Coppices, price of , . 108 

manner of making .... * 109 

Corn, measure and price of, at Briarre 100 

measure and price of, elsewhere 182 

mode of sowing 192 

Corn-mills i 53 

Cosne, town of 1 13 

Cottages 243 

Court of Justice, a French 249 

Cows, kinds of . 80 

price of 80 

Cress, cultivation of 35 

Crime, state of France with regard to 250 

Dagobert, King . . . . . 31 

Decametre, the measure called the : 182 

Denis, M 29 

Diligence, or French coach, at Calais 20 

Dunkirk 30 

Ecouen, castle at the town of . . . 61 

Essonne, village of , 75 

Essoudun, town of 133 

Evreux, city of 206 

Fagots, price of, at Clermont 59 

at Briarre 108 

Fair at St. Just 52 

Farmers, description of French 137 

Flax, cultivation of 35 



INDEX. 

Flax, mode of threshing 38 

Flers, village of 48 

Fontainebleau, town of 79 

forest of 78 

Forest d'Eau, Le 235 

Fromenteau, village of 75 

Fruit at St. Qmer's 29 

Fuel, price of, in Normandy 186 

Game, and « Game-Laws" 103, 104 

Garden of plants, the 66 

GilBlas 15 

Girardot, M., the garden of 70 

Goats 153 

Grain, mode of sowing 94 

Harasdupin 195 

Harvest, lateness of the, in Artois 26 

Hectolitre, the measure called the 182 

Hesdin, the town of 239 

Hoggart, Mr 89, 98 

Horse, duty and charges on a 10 

Horse-doctor, fee of a 28 

Horses, description of, and price of the French .... 52, 80 

cost of shoeing 23 

cost of, at livery 71 

the King's stud of 195 

Hops, price of, at Beauvoir 1 14 

H&tel-Dieu, the institution called 210, 211 

House-reut, cost of 187 

Implements of husbandry, cost of, &c 85, 231 

Indian-corn , 170,175 

Inns in France 48, 120, 121 

Iron, manufacture of, and price of , 200 

Jesuits, church of the, at St. Omers 33 



INDEX. 

Joan of Arc, the statue of, at Rouen 228 

Juine, the river 75 

Kew garden 66 

Knitting and spinning 5 1, 83, 123 

Labouring people, state of 243, 105, 145 

wages of 203 

Dress of 22,35,106 

civility of 50 

La Charite, town of 118 

L'Aigle, town of 197 

Laigneville, village of ^ ..... » 58 

Lamorlai, village of 58 

Land, price of, at Briarre 97, 111 

taxes on l . , Ill 

measure of 97 

rent of 98 

right of Foreigners to possess 99 

measures of, in Normandy 183 

price of 184, 185 

Laquette, the river 34 

La Recousse, village of 26 

League, land-league, the distance of 19 

Le Mans, city of 172 

Limosin, the horses of 195 

Lillers, village of 34 

Loches, town of 147, 148 

Locust-trees 60, 61, 158 

Loing, the river 80 

Loire, the river , 89, 95 

Louviers, town of, manufactures of 208 

Lord, a Frenchman's idea of an English 157 

Lucerne 5<5 

Lucerne, hay made of 93, 179 



INDEX. 

Luxeuil, monastery of 31 

Lys, the river 34 

Luzarches, town of 58 

Manufactures, domestic - 51, 83, 124, 171 

Merielle, Mi, garden of 70 

Meurice, H6tel de, at Calais 13 

at Paris 73 

Montargis, town of 80, 96 

Montreuil, the fruit cultivated at 70 

Montmorency, Due de * . . . . 61 

Mules i 138 

Nemours, village of 80 

Neufchatel, town of * 234 

Nogent, town of 89 

Nonant, village of 195 

Normandy, the people of 215 

law and custom of 216 

Novain, the river 113 

Oise, the river .......; » 57 

Omer, St. Bishop of Terouane 31 

Orge, the river 75 

Ostlers in France 44 

Ouen, St. Bishop of Rouen -. . . . 226 

Church of St. 226 

Oxen, kind of 85, 144 

manner of working 137 

Paine, Mr. 65 

Paris 65 

environs of 71 

Parsons, English 193 

Pauperism • • • 210 

Pays de Caux, the women of the 21n 

Peat, used as fuel 240 



INDEX. 

Pernes, the village of 34 

Pigs 145 

Pythagoreans, Frenchmen no 129 

"Poaching" 105 

Pont Sans Pareil, Le 24 

Poor, provision made for the 210 

Puppies, cultivation and harvest of 36 

Potatoes 87, 177 

Pouilly, town of 117 

Press, state of the, in France 165 

Priests, contrast the French and the English 193, 255 

Primogeniture, the law of 217, 218 

Quick-set hedges 77 

Rape, or coleseed, manner of cultivating 26 

Real estate, law relating to the disposal of 99 

Religion 255, 227 

Revolution, the effects of the French \ 2/ '^ fy %\% 27 

Richlieu, Cardinal 66 

Ris, village of 75 

Roads 64 

Rosseau, Jean-Jacques 43,58 

Rouen, city of 214,215,224 

Sabots, or wooden shoes 84 

Sansarge, hamlet of 121 

Schooling in France, cost of 1 88 

Seez, town of 194 

Sheep, in Picardy 47 

price of, in Gastinois 102 

Sheep, in Touraine 152 

in Normandy 202 

Sheep-fold 55 

Shoes, price of , , , . . 208 



INDEX. 

Somerville, Lord, his invention 137 

Spanish officers, smoking in bed 127 

Spanish-war 251 , 259 

St. Just, town of 45 

St. Omers, city of 30 

origin of the name of 34 

Sunday not always a holyday 200 

Table d'Hdte, description of a 13 

Talmas, village of 45 

Taxes 254 

Teazles 56 

Timber, price of, in Normandy 186 

measure of 186 

price of, at Briarre 103 

Tours, city of 151, 152, 162, 163 

Towns and villages, appearance of 34, 88 

Turkeys 48,86 

Turneps, women hoeing 35 

Vegetables, not so much eaten by the French as is sup- 
posed 32, 43 

Villedieu, village of 142 

Vintage, the process of the 115 

Vines, cultivation of 158 

Wages of labourers 48, 81 

Washing horses 44 

Washing clothes 209 

Wheat, at Calais 22 

price of 182 

Wine, at Briarre, price of 110 

process of making 115 

at Tours 158 

Women, the employment of, in out-door labour 35 

threshing wheat and rye 46 



INDEX. 

Women , heavy work imposed upon 149 

Women of Normandy, the 215 

Work-houses, the English 210 

Yevrette, the river 125 

Young, Mr. Arthur 175, 253 



ERRATUM. 

In paragraph 120, for Porse aux Chevaux, read Poste 
mix Chevaux. 



B. Bmslcy, Boil Court. Fleet Street. 



tiifc; 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

030 227 905 6 



